curious fact that in some of his speculations Erasmus
Darwin anticipated the views touching the evolution of organic life
subsequently announced by Lamarck, and ultimately incorporated by
Charles Darwin in the theory that bears his name. The only taste kindred
to natural history which Dr. Darwin possessed in common with his father
and his son was a love of plants. The garden of his house in Shrewsbury,
where Charles Darwin spent his boyhood, was filled with ornamental
trees and shrubs, as well as fruit-trees.

When Charles Darwin was about eight years old, he was sent to a
day-school, and it seems that even at this time his taste for natural
history, and especially for collecting shells and minerals, was well
developed. In the summer of 1818 he entered Dr. Butler's great school in
Shrewsbury, well known to the amateur makers of Latin verse by the
volume entitled "Sabrinae Corolla." He expressed the opinion in later
life that nothing could have been worse for the development of his mind
than this school, as it was strictly classical, nothing else being
taught except a little ancient biography and history. During his whole
life he was singularly incapable of mastering any language. With respect
to science, he continued collecting minerals with much zeal, and after
reading White's "Selborne" he took much pleasure in watching the habits
of birds. Towards the close of his school life he became deeply
interested in chemistry, and was allowed to assist his elder brother in
some laboratory experiments. In October, 1825, he proceeded to Edinburgh
University, where he stayed for two years. He found the lectures
intolerably dull, with the exception of those on chemistry. Curiously
enough, while walking one day with a fellow-undergraduate, the latter
burst forth in high admiration of Lamarck and his views on evolution. So
far as Darwin could afterwards judge, no impression was made upon his
own mind. He had previously read his grandfather's "Zooenomia," in which
similar views had been propounded, but no discernible effect had been
produced upon him. Nevertheless, it is probable enough that the hearing
rather early in life such views maintained and praised may have favored
his upholding them under a different form in the "Origin of Species."

While at Edinburgh, Darwin was a member of the Plinian Society, and read
a couple of papers on some observations in natural history. After two
sessions had been spent at Edinburgh, Darwin's fat