512 LETTERS TO DARWIN AND OTHERS. [1863, 



for miles and miles, i. e., no hardship, except any that 

 a drunken laborer might bring on his family ; and I 

 longed to take you out with us in our drives, that you 

 might see a happy and comfortable country, more and 

 more so every year, and perhaps a larger ratio of the 

 population refined to a reasonable degree in feeling and 

 life than I know of in any other part of the world. 



I will consider about fantastic variation of pigeons. 

 I see afar trouble enough ahead quoad design in na- 

 ture, but have managed to keep off the chilliness by 

 giving the knotty questions a rather wide berth. If 

 I rather avoid, I cannot ignore the difficulties ahead. 

 But if I adopt your view bodily, can you promise me 

 any less difficulties ? 



If your Lythrum paper shall be at all equal in in- 

 terest to that on Linum, it will be a gem. 



As to tendrils, what are Hooker and Oliver (the 

 latter a professor, too) about, and where have they 

 lived not to know anything of them ? Everybody 

 must have seen, in Cucurbitaceae and Passiflora, ten- 

 drils reaching out straight for a certain time, and 

 then, if they reach nothing, coiling up from the end. 

 Also the sweeping of stems. . . . 



P. S. [To the above ?] Three numbers of Boston 

 newspapers recently sent you, two by this mail (in 

 which my good beau-pere is again " spiking the Eng- 

 lish "), please to forward to Reuben Harvey, Esq., 

 Limerick, Ireland. 



You are quite out in supposing that hatred of Eng- 

 land is increasing, or that there is the least desire to 

 meddle with you, except in self-defense. 



My own feelings were very sensitive at first, because 

 I expected better things, and I then deferred much 

 to British opinion. I now do neither, and nothing 



