Summary

CD will not get to Maer that week. The Langtons are leaving and will meet him at Shrewsbury.

Summary

They are impatient for CD’s arrival.

EW is reading F. Head’s "gallop" [Rapid journeys across the Pampas (1826)] "to get up a little knowledge for him".

CD has nearly settled in favour of living in Cambridge.

Summary

The Darwin family are anxious for FEEW’s and Hensleigh’s opinions of CD’s journal. EW is convinced that Henry Holland is wrong if he thinks it not worth publishing.

Summary

Tells of the pleasure that CD’s visit gave the family.

Summary

Expresses his feelings following the death of Charles Lyell.

Summary

Discusses apple specimens received from CL; reversion to crab state. Cites passage on subject in Variation.

Comments on letter from Mr Wood on inheritance in fruit-trees.

Would like to cross flowers of "Hawthornden" with many distinct varieties.

Summary

Reminisces on the evening he, B. J. Sulivan, and J. C. Wickham from the Beagle spent with CD, nearly ten years ago.

Hopes the mission at Tierra del Fuego will not "improve" the people to extinction.

Summary

Is pleased that CD has [Roland] Trimen to collect specimens of Cape orchids. Suggests directions for securing dry specimens of what he draws.

Identifies Disa barbata and D. Cornuta of the Ophridiae.

Summary

Thanks HWB for references.

Praises his paper ["Contributions to an insect fauna of the Amazon valley", read before Linnean Society, 21 Nov 1861, Trans. Linn. Soc. Lond. 23 (1862) : 495–566] which solves "one of the most perplexing problems which could be given to solve".

Discusses the difficulties of writing and expresses disappointment at Wallace’s book [Travels on the Amazon (1861)].

Summary

Thanks WL for his MS on coral and suggests that it be sent to the Geological Society for printing or preserving in the archives.

Comments on his and WL’s bad health and recalls WL’s past kindness to him.

Summary

Delighted that Brongniart thinks Sigillaria aquatic, and that E. W. Binney thinks coal is a sort of submarine peat. Thinks coal-plants will prove to be aquatic, though JDH will sneer at this.

Has acquired a new microscope.

Summary

Is "stomachy and be-blue-devilled" because of costs of publishing [Zoology and Coral reefs]. Wonders how the remainder [of the Zoology and Geology of "Beagle"] can be published without taking £200 or £300 out of their personal funds.

Summary

Is correcting proofs for Expression.

Family news.

Summary

No Benjamin Franklin letters to Erasmus Darwin preserved.

Was inaccurate about Franklin’s nephews [in Erasmus Darwin].

Recounts story about Franklin at court of France.

Summary

Thanks for Dawson’s letter. Doubts his evidence that climate of land was not glacial when upheaved after submergence.

Encloses memorandum of questions for C. V. Naudin.

Expression of the emotions.

Is building a hothouse for plant experimenting.

JDH’s ideas on America are more atrocious than his. What a new idea that struggle for existence is necessary to try to purge a government! Probably true. Slavery draws him one way one day, another the next. Yankees are "detestable toward us". Tocqueville.

Summary

Discusses Rugby and education in general. The enormous proportion of time spent on classics checks interest "in anything in which reasoning & observation comes into play".

Expresses shock and sympathy on learning of the deaths in WDF’s house.

Summary

Describes his lectures on CD’s theory.

Thanks CD for copy of Variation. Comments on book.

Describes work of two protégés in Jena: Nicolas von Miklucho[-Maclay] and Anton Dohrn.

His cousin, Wilhelm Bleek, is sending an article about the origin of language.

Asks to keep book a few months longer but will return it if CD needs it [Webb and Berthelot, Histoire naturelle des Îles Canaries, vol. 3, pt 1: Géographie botanique (1840)].

Describes research on Siphonophora.

Describes life in Jena. Mentions alpine accident during wedding trip.

Summary

PGK’s letter stirred memories of their old days in the Beagle.

Gives news of his work on cirripedes. Would like to examine Scalpellum papillosum of King from Patagonia if PGK’s father has a duplicate in his collection.