S6 THE UNFINISHED BOOK. [1856. 



more than you now do. The hawks have behaved like 

 gentlemen, and have cast up pellets with lots of seeds in 

 them ; and I have just had a parcel of partridge's feet well 

 caked with mud ! ! ! * Adios. 



Your insane and perverse friend, 



C. Darwin. 



C. Darwin to J. D. Hooker. 



Down, Nov. 4th [1856]. 

 My DEAR HOOKER, I thank you more cordially than you 

 will think probable, for your note. Your verdict f has been 

 a great relief. On my honour I had no idea whether or not 

 you would say it was (and I knew you would say it very 

 kindly) so bad, that you would have begged me to have 

 burnt the whole. To my own mind my MS. relieved me 

 of some few difficulties, and the difficulties seemed to me 

 pretty fairly stated, but I had become so bewildered with 

 conflicting facts, evidence, reasoning and opinions, that I felt 

 to myself that I had lost all judgment. Your general verdict 

 is incomparably more favourable than I had anticipated . . . 



C. Darwin to J. D. Hooker. 



Down, Nov. 23rd [1856]. 



My DEAR HOOKER, I fear I shall weary you with letters, 

 but do not answer this, for in truth and without flattery, I so 

 value your letters, that after a heavy batch, as of late, I feel 

 that I have been extravagant and have drawn too much 

 money, and shall therefore have to stint myself on another 

 occasion. 



When I sent my MS. I felt strongly that some preliminary 

 questions on the causes of variation ought to have been sent 

 you. Whether I am right or wrong in these points is quite a 



* The mud in such cases often f On the MS. relating to geo- 



contains seeds, so that plants are graphical distribution, 

 thus transported. 



