My dear Hooker

I have this minute finished reading your splendid, but too short, Address.—¹ I cannot doubt that it will have been fully appreciated by the geographers at York: if not they are asses & fools

Sept. 4^th. After letting my enthusiasm thus escape, I suddenly felt burst up & had to stop.—

I am sorry that I forgot to remind you in relation to A. Blytt that S. B. Skertchly (of the Geolog. Survey) has observed analogous facts in the peat bogs of the Cambridgeshire fens; & I believe that he had come to this conclusion before he knew of Blytts views; at least I remember writing to tell him of them.²

You speak (p. 10) of a glacial period being “inferred” in the S. hemisphere: surely this is too weak a term considering the enormous number of huge angular erratic blocks of crystalline rocks on the Tertiary plains of Patagonia far from the Andes, & on the Is^d of Chiloe, likewise lying on a Tertiary formation & far from the Andes.—³ That seems to me a capital argument (p. 11) “the several S. temperate floras are more intimately related &c &c.⁴

I sh^d like to see this argument worked out in detail.

But my chief motive for writing is as follows: a young Portuguese a native of St. Michaels in the Azores seems to be an enthusiast about Geograph. Distribution, Evolution &c (& such a man in such a place is a prodigy) & he has published on land Mollusca & insects. He wrote to me to ask for hints, so I have told him to attend to all chance introductions & have given him hints, (which he is following) & I sent him Wallaces big book. Amongst other points I told him to collect the plants from the highest mountains of the several islands.⁵ He writes that he has made a collection from 2 hills, but these are only 480 & 384 metres high, & offers to send them to anyone whom I might suggest.⁶ I have told him that I would mention this to you, but that I thought that the heights were not nearly great enough.⁷ Please tell me whether they are worth sending to Kew, or shall I tell him to keep them, until he can get other collections. His name is F. d’Arruda Furtado.

I have no large note-paper with black edging, so have written on this.⁸

Ever yours | Ch. Darwin

By the way you pile in your Address honours on my old bald head.—⁹