account at your bankers. We have done this
to enable you to get such complete rest as you may require for the
re-establishment of your health; and in doing this we are convinced that
we act for the public interest, as well as in accordance with our most
earnest desires. Let me assure you that we are all your warm personal
friends, and that there is not a stranger or mere acquaintance amongst
us. If you could have heard what was said, or could have read what
was, as I believe, our inmost thoughts, you would know that we all feel
towards you, as we should to an honoured and much loved brother. I am
sure that you will return this feeling, and will therefore be glad to
give us the opportunity of aiding you in some degree, as this will be a
happiness to us to the last day of our lives. Let me add that our plan
occurred to several of your friends at nearly the same time and quite
independently of one another.

My dear Huxley, Your affectionate friend, CHARLES DARWIN.

LETTER 33. TO T.H. HUXLEY.

(33/1. The following letter is one of the earliest of the long series
addressed to Mr. Huxley.)

Down, April 23rd [1854].

My dear Sir

I have got out all the specimens, which I have thought could by any
possibility be of any use to you; but I have not looked at them, and
know not what state they are in, but should be much pleased if they are
of the smallest use to you. I enclose a catalogue of habitats: I thought
my notes would have turned out of more use. I have copied out such few
points as perhaps would not be apparent in preserved specimens. The
bottle shall go to Mr. Gray on Thursday next by our weekly carrier.

I am very much obliged for your paper on the Mollusca (33/2. The paper
of Huxley's is "On the Morphology of the Cephalous Mollusca, etc."
("Phil. Trans. R. Soc." Volume 143, Part I., 1853, page 29.)); I have
read it all with much interest: but it would be ridiculous in me to make
any remarks on a subject on which I am so utterly ignorant; but I can
see its high importance. The discovery of the type or "idea" (33/3.
Huxley defines his use of the word "archetype" at page 50: "All that I
mean is the conception of a form embodying the most general propositions
that can be affirmed respecting the Cephalous Mollusca, standing in the
same relation to them as the diagram to a geometrical theorem, and like
it, at once, imaginary and true.") (in your sense, for I detest the word
as used by Owen, Agassiz & Co.) of each g