Order of the proceedings at the Darwin celebration held at Cambridge, June 22-June 24, 1909 : with a sketch of Darwin's life.
- University of Cambridge
- Date:
- 1909
Licence: In copyright
Credit: Order of the proceedings at the Darwin celebration held at Cambridge, June 22-June 24, 1909 : with a sketch of Darwin's life. Source: Wellcome Collection.
30/52 page 16
![“On March 7, 1837, I took lodgings in [36] Great Marlborough Street in London, and remained there for nearly two years, until I was married.” 1838 “ In October 1838, that is, fifteen months after I had begun my systematic enquiry, I happened to read for amusement ‘ Malthus on Population,’ and being well prepared to appreciate the struggle for existence which every- where goes on from long-continued observation of the habits of animals and plants, it at once struck me that under these circumstances favourable variations would tend to be preserved, and unfavourable ones to be destroyed. The result of this would be the formation of new species. Here then I had at last got a theory by which to work ; but I was so anxious to avoid prejudice, that I determined not for some time to write even the briefest sketch of it.” 1839 Married at Maer (Staffordshire) to his cousin, Emma Wedgwood, b. 1808, d. 1896, daughter of Josiah Wedgwood. (Plate VI.) Dec. 31. “Entered 12 Upper Gower Street” [now no Gower Street, London]. “If the character of my father’s working life is to be understood, the conditions of ill-health, under which he worked, must be constantly borne in mind....No one indeed, except my mother, knows the full amount of suffering he endured, or the full amount of his wonderful patience. For all the latter years of his life she never left him for a night; and her days were so planned that all his resting hours might be shared with her. She shielded him from every avoidable annoyance, and omitted nothing that might save him trouble, or prevent him becoming overtired, or that might alleviate the many discomforts of his ill-health. I hesitate to speak thus freely of a thing so sacred as the life-long devotion which prompted all this constant and tender care. But it is, I repeat, a principal feature of his life, that for nearly forty years he never knew one day of the health of ordinary men, and that thus his life was one long struggle against the weariness and strain of sickness. And this cannot be told without speaking of the one condition which enabled him to bear the strain and fight out the struggle to the end.” Francis Darwin in The Life and Letters. Published Journal and Researches, being Vol. iii. of the Narrative of the Surveying Voyage of H.M.S. Adventure and Beagle— 1842 “ In June 1842 I first allowed myself the satisfaction of writing a very brief abstract of my [species] theory in pencil in 35 pagesL' and this was ^ This MS, published under the title The Foundations of the Origin of Species, will be presented by the Syndics of the University Press to the Delegates attending the Celebration.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b2898383x_0030.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
