On 17th January 1836 Charles Darwin travelled over the Blue Mountains from Sydney to Bathurst and recorded:
"In the middle of the day we baited our horses at a little inn, called the Weatherboard, the country here is elevated 2,800 feet above the sea."
The inn itself dates from around 1830 and was among the first travellers' rest places to develop along the newly opened western road, first explored by Gregory Blaxland, William Charles Wentworth and William Lawson in May 1813, surveyed by George Evans and built by William Cox with his convict chain gang in 1815. It gave its name to the township of Weatherboard that grew up in the area which was later renamed Wentworth Falls after the explorer and nearby waterfall which Darwin also visited on the day.
The pipes, mug, china, decanter base and bottle base were among material excavated from the Weatherboard Inn site in 1985 and now held in the Blue Mountains City Library. This material was recently submitted for DNA residue analysis and the report has returned a positive match; the following reconstruction is based on these results and contemporary accounts.
"Well then 'tis a miser ye are sir and no mistake, so to hell with ye and take that! And that too!"
"Lookout! Hold him! The madman has broken my pipe and mug and now means to brain me with the rum bottle, someone call for the landlady, for her best crystal decanter is lost."
"Aye to the devil with ye then, and take your damn t'backy and your monkey notions too!"
"Mister Darwin, sir, what have you done! That decanter was mother's and come all the way from home. And now you insult my guests with your unnatural philosophy. It is too much sir, now be off with you, before I call my husband."
"No need for that madam, your victuals are poor and your wine worse, the bedbugs I need not mention. Now I must be off to view your waterfall and the whimpering rock nearby."
"In the middle of the day we baited our horses at a little inn, called the Weatherboard, the country here is elevated 2,800 feet above the sea."
The inn itself dates from around 1830 and was among the first travellers' rest places to develop along the newly opened western road, first explored by Gregory Blaxland, William Charles Wentworth and William Lawson in May 1813, surveyed by George Evans and built by William Cox with his convict chain gang in 1815. It gave its name to the township of Weatherboard that grew up in the area which was later renamed Wentworth Falls after the explorer and nearby waterfall which Darwin also visited on the day.
The pipes, mug, china, decanter base and bottle base were among material excavated from the Weatherboard Inn site in 1985 and now held in the Blue Mountains City Library. This material was recently submitted for DNA residue analysis and the report has returned a positive match; the following reconstruction is based on these results and contemporary accounts.
Save the China!
Parlour of the Weatherboard Inn, 17 Jan 1836, luncheon
"Ah now, Mr Darwin sir, I'd be glad of another fill o' your navy twist for my pipe, so I would."
"Have a care fellow, 'tis the finest Virginia leaf and the last of a gift from my dear friend Capt Fitzroy of our ship, Beagle, now berthed in Sydney Cove.""Well then 'tis a miser ye are sir and no mistake, so to hell with ye and take that! And that too!"
"Lookout! Hold him! The madman has broken my pipe and mug and now means to brain me with the rum bottle, someone call for the landlady, for her best crystal decanter is lost."
"Aye to the devil with ye then, and take your damn t'backy and your monkey notions too!"
"Mister Darwin, sir, what have you done! That decanter was mother's and come all the way from home. And now you insult my guests with your unnatural philosophy. It is too much sir, now be off with you, before I call my husband."
"No need for that madam, your victuals are poor and your wine worse, the bedbugs I need not mention. Now I must be off to view your waterfall and the whimpering rock nearby."
***
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| Weeping Rock above Wentworth Falls, author photo |
The signed portrait above is scanned from my copy of the fifth edition of "On the Origin of Species...", published on 10 February 1869, which incorporates a number of changes and for the first time included the phrase "survival of the fittest", which had been coined by the philosopher Herbert Spencer in his Principles of Biology (1864).
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