Free IGMS Issue 15 by IGMS Page A

something happened which quite put my thoughts in a fluster.
    Here at the Establishment we meet many people, fellow sufferers all, and I had been introduced to a Mrs. Danzig who stoically endures fearful attacks of dropsy. Her niece lives in one of the farms along the edge of the Moor, and last Friday the girl -- Annette -- arrived here and rather insisted on speaking with me. Her manner was shrill, and one hesitates to interrupt one's Billiards when feeling relaxed after purging, but I at last consented when I perceived she would not relent.
    "Mr. Darwin, my aunt tells me that you are a most eminent naturalist. You have travelled all around the world and seen every creature that God has made."
    She spoke the latter phrase -- "God has made" -- in the manner of a commonplace expression, rather than in the reverential tone that you, my old Fox, might use in a sermon. I am compelled to notice the particular ways in which people speak of Religion, as it so often affects how they comprehend my Theory. (Indeed, I find that my Theory affects how I comprehend Religion, as I shall relate.) The girl's comportment suggested that in reaching perhaps nineteen years of age, she had received only rudimentary education -- as is, alas, all too common among her class.
    "I have indeed travelled far, Miss Annette," I said, "but I would not claim to have seen every creature that lives on the Earth, nor indeed in England."
    "But you have books, don't you? You would know whether a creature was something extraordinary?"
    I said, "I'm acquainted with the broad kinds of plants and animals that natural science has so far discovered. Do I understand that you have seen a rare creature?"
    "I've not only seen it, I've captured it!"
    Country folk are familiar with the wildlife of fields and woods. Since the girl lived on a farm, I puzzled to think what she might have captured that she would not recognise. Perhaps it had escaped from some private menagerie.
    "What does it look like?" I asked.
    "It looks like . . ." She paused inordinately, then just as I was about to speak, she blurted out, "I do not say it
is
, sir -- I only say what it looks like. But it looks like a fairy!"
    I returned an equally long pause. I had not expected such an answer. At last I said, "In what way does it look like a fairy?"
    "It has wings!" she exclaimed.
    "Are you sure it isn't some sort of bird? Perhaps you are unaware that parrots can be trained to talk."
    She shook her head, and muttered something that might almost have been an oath. "I can recognise a magpie from a mouse. It's not a bird at all. Be it ever so small, it has the face of man, except with a greenish cast."
    On this, I naturally suspected some poor human wretch, perhaps with chlorosis and a hunched deformity that could be mistaken for wings.
    "You would be better calling for a doctor."
    The girl gave me such a look as I have not received for many a year. It took me back to our time at Cambridge -- my dear Fox, do you remember those days we chased after beetles! -- when the tutors frowned with desiccated contempt at our more otiose utterings. Yet here I was at 50, as old as a senior Don, being patronised by a girl the age of a student, looking at me as if I'd ludicrously confused the Homoousion and Homoiousion creeds.
    "I live on a farm," she said. "I wouldn't call a doctor to the lambs or the swine, and I wouldn't call him to this. Neither would I call a veterinarian! I tell you, sir, the creature is unprecedented."
    Clearly, nothing would do but that I examine it. "Can you bring it here, or must I travel?"
    "It's in our barn, if you could come and look. 'Tisn't far -- just a couple of miles."
    Ah, the thoughtlessness of youth! Speaking to someone old and grey and ill, she said that "a couple of miles" wasn't very far. Nevertheless, I thought I might manage it. I'd yet seen little of the Yorkshire countryside, and a short excursion might be pleasant and indeed restorative. Too, of course, I was curious to see the