The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin – Day 33 of 188

Sometimes when alone he stood still or walked stealthily to observe birds or beasts. It was on one of these occasions that some young squirrels ran up his back and legs, while their mother barked at them in an agony from the tree. He always found birds’ nests even up to the last years of his life, and we, as children, considered that he had a special genius in this direction. In his quiet prowls he came across the less common birds, but I fancy he used to conceal it from me, as a little boy, because he observed the agony of mind which I endured at not having seen the siskin or goldfinch, or whatever it might have been. He used to tell us how, when he was creeping noiselessly along in the “Big-Woods,” he came upon a fox asleep in the daytime, which was so much astonished that it took a good stare at him before it ran off. A Spitz dog which accompanied him showed no sign of excitement at the fox, and he used to end the story by wondering how the dog could have been so faint-hearted.

Another favourite place was “Orchis Bank,” above the quiet Cudham valley, where fly- and musk-orchis grew among the junipers, and Cephalanthera and Neottia under the beech boughs; the little wood “Hangrove,” just above this, he was also fond of, and here I remember his collecting grasses, when he took a fancy to make out the names of all the common kinds. He was fond of quoting the saying of one of his little boys, who, having found a grass that his father had not seen before, had it laid by his own plate during dinner, remarking, “I are an extraordinary grass-finder!”

My father much enjoyed wandering slowly in the garden with my mother or some of his children, or making one of a party, sitting out on a bench on the lawn; he generally sat, however, on the grass, and I remember him often lying under one of the big lime-trees, with his head on the green mound at its foot. In dry summer weather, when we often sat out, the big fly-wheel of the well was commonly heard spinning round, and so the sound became associated with those pleasant days. He used to like to watch us playing at lawn-tennis, and often knocked up a stray ball for us with the curved handle of his stick.

Though he took no personal share in the management of the garden, he had great delight in the beauty of flowers–for instance, in the mass of Azaleas which generally stood in the drawing-room. I think he sometimes fused together his admiration of the structure of a flower and of its intrinsic beauty; for instance, in the case of the big pendulous pink and white flowers of Dielytra. In the same way he had an affection, half-artistic, half-botanical, for the little blue Lobelia. In admiring flowers, he would often laugh at the dingy high-art colours, and contrast them with the bright tints of nature. I used to like to hear him admire the beauty of a flower; it was a kind of gratitude to the flower itself, and a personal love for its delicate form and colour. I seem to remember him gently touching a flower he delighted in; it was the same simple admiration that a child might have.

He could not help personifying natural things. This feeling came out in abuse as well as in praise–e.g. of some seedlings–“The little beggars are doing just what I don’t want them to.” He would speak in a half-provoked, half-admiring way of the ingenuity of a Mimosa leaf in screwing itself out of a basin of water in which he had tried to fix it. One must see the same spirit in his way of speaking of Sundew, earth-worms, etc. (Cf. Leslie Stephen’s ‘Swift,’ 1882, page 200, where Swift’s inspection of the manners and customs of servants are compared to my father’s observations on worms, “The difference is,” says Mr. Stephen, “that Darwin had none but kindly feelings for worms.”)

Within my memory, his only outdoor recreation, besides walking, was riding, which he took to on the recommendation of Dr. Bence Jones, and we had the luck to find for him the easiest and quietest cob in the world, named “Tommy.” He enjoyed these rides extremely, and devised a number of short rounds which brought him home in time for lunch. Our country is good for this purpose, owing to the number of small valleys which give a variety to what in a flat country would be a dull loop of road. He was not, I think, naturally fond of horses, nor had he a high opinion of their intelligence, and Tommy was often laughed at for the alarm he showed at passing and repassing the same heap of hedge-clippings as he went round the field. I think he used to feel surprised at himself, when he remembered how bold a rider he had been, and how utterly old age and bad health had taken away his nerve. He would say that riding prevented him thinking much more effectually than walking–that having to attend to the horse gave him occupation sufficient to prevent any really hard thinking. And the change of scene which it gave him was good for spirits and health.

Unluckily, Tommy one day fell heavily with him on Keston common. This, and an accident with another horse, upset his nerves, and he was advised to give up riding.

If I go beyond my own experience, and recall what I have heard him say of his love for sport, etc., I can think of a good deal, but much of it would be a repetition of what is contained in his ‘Recollections.’ At school he was fond of bat-fives, and this was the only game at which he was skilful. He was fond of his gun as quite a boy, and became a good shot; he used to tell how in South America he killed twenty-three snipe in twenty-four shots. In telling the story he was careful to add that he thought they were not quite so wild as English snipe.

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