Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1882-05-10
DafWin,S Home.

From the London Daily News
Perhaps a more striking illustration of the
isolation of DOwne could not be given than the
fact that. although Mr.. Darwin here breathed
his last at o'clock in the afternoon OF Wednes-
day, the news which has since been received
with profound sorrow in every part of the
civilized world was not known in London until
noon of the following day.
In this secluded and beautiful district, at
some two or three hundred yards only on the
further side Of the village the ilustrious au-
thor of "The Origin of Species by means of
Natural Selection" passed the last forty years of
his laborious life. Having finally given up his
residence in town in 1910, soon after his mar
riage, he found the retirement essential to his
habits OF systematic study and of patient inves-
tigatiOn of the laws of nature; here, in the eX-
tensive grounds of the old house which is soon
to know him no more, he conducted those bo-
tanlcal and other experiments and observations
of which the results are recorded in that long
list OF works wherein the doctrine of evolution
has found ineXhaustible illustration. "Downe
Court is one of the old square-built red-brick
mansions OF the last century, to which has been
added in more recent times q gable-frOnted
wing. with another square-built wing and pill
Jared portico on the corresponding side. Shut
in and almost hidden from the roadway by a
high wall and belt Of trees, it seems the very
ideal of place for philosophical seclusion. On
a paddock or meadow equally retired, and
bounded by tract OfunderwoOd through which
there Is lovely view of the narrow valley de-
scending toward Tatsfield and Westerham. In
these extensive additions to the grounds Of
DOwne Court, which Mr.. Darwin had rented of
his intimate friend and neighbor, Sir John Lub-
book, he had Of late years been accustomed for
the most part to take his daily exercise with the
regularity which distinguished most of his
habits. Up to ten or twelve years ago his tall
1O11r tod foun ifn pl6
was familiar object in the lanes round about;
but the unfortunate animal, seized with fit one
day, fell, and died by the roadside, after which
it was observed that Mr. Darwin was never
seen to ride again. His invariable hours for
walking every day were in the morning, noon
day. and o'clock in the afternoon sometimes
accompanied by his sons, one of whom Mr.
Francis Darwin, has long been established as a
surgeon in the village, but more often alone.
Rising always at the early hour Of6 to take
his cold bath-intO which he was accustomed to
plunge both morning and eYening-he break
tasted alone; and after his first morning walk
was in his library as a-rule at 8. At 9, when
the pOst-bOy arrived from FarnbOrOugh, he
would spend a little time in the dining groom
opening letters and Swimming the papers, and
in the evening would linger an hour or so in the
society of his family. or of some of those friends
distinguished in the world of science, who Oc-
casionally found their way to Downe Court; but
the greater part of his time was spent in his
his little domain. When he extended his walks
into the country round about, it was observed
that he was rarely seen in the village or met on
the roads, preferring, as he did, to take his way
generally southwark by the fOOtpaths through ,
the woods and meadows. Little children, who
have quick instinct for kind and gentle ma
ture, would run to open gate when they saw
Mr.. Darwin coming, encouraged thereto by a
smile and kind word. Downe folk, by whom
he was much beloved, like now to dwell upon
hos Fri md tn <,f ~nsI -
kindness to all about him. They point with a
sort of pride to the fact that the dOmestics at
Downe Court are mostly old servants; that his
maid, Margaret Evans, who assisted in nursing
him in his last illness, entered his service when
girl, at Shrewsbury, nearly forty years ago,
her aunt and uncle being butler and house
keeper to Mr.. Darwin's father, DR.. Robert War
ing Darwin, in that city. The intelligence of his
death came upon the place with painful sud-
denness Ii was known that he had been
poorly for few weeks; thatit had been deemed
advisable about month ago to send a servant
to London to fetch a chair constructed for car
rying an invalid, the weakness of the action of
the heart rendering even the slight exertOn of
ascending the single flight Of stairs to his bed
room perilOus in the opinion of his medical adj
visers. But, with care. sufferers from heart dis
ease often live long. and he was in the main
still able to pursue his customary habits. On
Tuesday morning his devoted friend and COM
rade in the field Of science. Sir John Lubbock
tary duties In London, and found him, as it
seemed, pretty much as usual. That matters
had taken grave turn became known for the
first time when, on Wednesday afternoon, his
groom arrived gallOping through the village
upon horse sprinkled with foam, and carrying
under his arm wet and dripping bag Of ice.
He had been dispatched in haste to Bromley
the nearest point at which such an article could
be obtained, and had accomplished the ride of
about twelve miles in something less than an
hour; but unhappily the relief arrived too late
to be of service. The sufferer had already
sunk to his rest, surrounded by his family, in
Guiding Mrs Darwin, several Of his sons and
married daughter.
The churchyard of Downe, in which some Of
Mr.. Darwin's children are buried, can hardly be
said to be retired spot. being surrounded on
three sides by the village street. from which it
is separated only by low wall but it lies under
the shade of tall elms while near the porch
venerable yew, with q trunk measuring. it is
said, nearly twenty three feet in girth, adds to
the solemn associations of the place. In the
chuichyard near the south door, lie buried. as
shown by the inscriptions on fat tablet over
the graves, the two infant children of Mr. OAR
win, Mary Eleanor. who died in 1872 and
Charles Warning Darwin, who died in 1858, being
then only two years old. Near them, under
the melancholy bOughs Of the great yew tree,
sleep two members of the Wedgwood family, to
which, as Is well known, Mr.. Darwin was re-
lated by the side Of his mother, well as by his
own marriage with his cousin, Miss WedgwoOd |
One OF them Is Miss Sarah Wedgwood, grand |
daughter of the celebrated manufacturer OF art
many years in an oddly built old house with a |
lofty tower in the village. and who here went |
eightY-six.
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