322 EVOLUTION [CHAP. V 



Letter 236 particles (my gem-mules from the separate cells of the lower 

 creatures !) will keep alive and afterwards multiply under 

 proper conditions. 



What an interesting problem it is. 



Letter 237 To W. B. Tegetmeier. 



Down, July I5th [1870]. 



It is very long since I have heard from you, and I am much 

 obliged for your letter. It is good news that you are going 

 to bring out a new edition of your Poultry book, 1 and you are 

 quite at liberty to use all my materials. Thanks for the 

 curious case of the wild duck variation : I have heard of 

 other instances of a tendency to vary in one out of a large 

 litter or family. I have too many things in hand at present 

 to profit by your offer of the loan of the American Poultry 

 book. 



Pray keep firm to your idea of working out the subject of 

 analogous variations 2 with pigeons ; I really think you might 

 thus make a novel and valuable contribution to science. I 

 can, however, quite understand how much your time must be 

 occupied with the never-ending, always-beginning editorial 

 cares. 



I keep much as usual, and crawl on with my work. 



Letter 238 To J. D. Hooker. 



Down, Sept. 27th [1870]. 



Yours was a splendid letter, and I was very curious to 

 hear something about the Liverpool 3 meeting, which I much 

 wished to be successful for Huxley's sake. I am surprised 

 that you think his address would not have been clear to the 

 public ; it seemed to me as clear as water. The general line 

 of his argument might have been answered by the case of 



1 The Poultry Book, 1872. 



2 " By this term I mean that similar characters occasionally make 

 their appearance in the several varieties or races descended from the 

 same species, and more rarely in the offspring of widely distinct species " 

 {Animals and Phvits, II., Ed. II., p. 340). 



3 Mr. Huxley was President of the British Association at Liverpool in 

 1870. His Presidential Address on "Biogenesis and Abiogenesis" is 

 reprinted in his collected Essays, VIII., p. 229. Some account of the 

 meeting is given in Huxley's Life and Letter 's, Vol. I., pp. 332, 336. 



