CHARLES DARWIN TO G. CROOM ROBERTSON. (The editor of 'Mind.') Down, April 27, 1877.
Dear Sir,
I hope that you will be so good as to take the trouble to read the enclosed MS., and if you think it fit for publication in your admirable journal of 'Mind,' I shall be gratified. If you do not think it fit, as is very likely, will you please to return it to me. I hope that you will read it in an extra critical spirit, as I cannot judge whether it is worth publishing from having been so much interested in watching the dawn of the several faculties in my own infant. I may add that I should never have thought of sending you the MS., had not M. Taine's article appeared in your Journal. (1877, page 252. The original appeared in the 'Revue Philosophique' 1876.) If my MS. is printed, I think that I had better see a proof.
I remain, dear Sir, Yours faithfully, CH. DARWIN.
[The two following extracts show the lively interest he preserved in diverse fields of enquiry. Professor Cohn of Breslau had mentioned, in a letter, Koch's researches on Splenic Fever, my father replied, January 3:—
"I well remember saying to myself, between twenty and thirty years ago, that if ever the origin of any infectious disease could be proved, it would be the greatest triumph to science; and now I rejoice to have seen the triumph."
In the spring he received a copy of Dr. E. von Mojsisovics' 'Dolomit Riffe,' his letter to the author (June 1, 1878) is interesting as bearing on the influence of his own work on the methods of geology.
"I have at last found time to read the first chapter of your 'Dolomit Riffe,' and have been EXCEEDINGLY interested by it. What a wonderful change in the future of Geological chronology you indicate, by assuming the descent theory to be established, and then taking the graduated changes of the same group of organisms as the true standard! I never hoped to live to see such a step even proposed by any one."
Another geological research which roused my father's admiration was Mr. D. Mackintosh's work on erratic blocks. Apart from its intrinsic merit the work keenly excited his sympathy from the conditions under which it was executed, Mr. Mackintosh being compelled to give nearly his whole time to tuition. The following passage is from a letter to Mr. Mackintosh of October 9, 1879, and refers to his paper in the Journal of the Geological Society, 1878:—
"I hope that you will allow me to have the pleasure of thanking you for the very great pleasure which I have derived from just reading your paper on erratic blocks. The map is wonderful, and what labour each of those lines show! I have thought for some years that the agency of floating ice, which nearly half a century ago was overrated, has of late been underrated. You are the sole man who has ever noticed the distinction suggested by me (In his paper on the 'Ancient Glaciers of Carnarvonshire,' Phil. Mag. xxi. 1842.) between flat or planed scored rocks, and mammillated scored rocks.">[