34 SPREAD OF EVOLUTION. [1865. 



I hope to read it all, but unfortunately reading makes my 

 head whiz more than anything else. I am able most days to 

 work for two or three hours, and this makes all the difference 

 in my happiness. I have resolved not to be tempted astray, 

 and to publish nothing till my volume on Variation is com- 

 pleted. You gave me excellent advice about the footnotes in 

 my Dog chapter, but their alteration gave me infinite trouble, 

 and I often wished all the dogs, and I fear sometimes you 

 yourself, in the nether regions. 



We (dictator and writer) send our best love to Lady Lyell. 



Yours affectionately, 



Charles Darwin. 



P.S. — If ever you should speak with the Duke on the sub- 

 ject, please say how much interested I was with his address. 



[In his autobiographical sketch, my father has remarked 

 (p. 40) that owing to certain early memories he felt the 

 honour of being elected to the Royal and Royal Medical 

 Societies of Edinburgh " more than any similar honour." 

 The following extract from a letter to Sir Joseph Hooker 

 refers to his election to the former of these societies. The 

 latter part of the extract refers to the Berlin Academy, to 

 which he was elected in 1878 : — 



" Here is a really curious thing, considering that Brewster 

 is President and Balfour Secretary. I have been elected 

 Honorary Member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. And 

 this leads me to a third question. Does the Berlin Academy 

 of Sciences send their Proceedings to Honorary Members ? I 

 want to know, to ascertain whether I am a member ; I suppose 

 not, for I think it would have made some impression on me ; 

 yet I distinctly remember receiving some diploma signed by 

 Ehrenberg. I have been so careless ; I have lost several 

 diplomas, and now I want to know what Societies I belong to, 

 as I observe every [one] tacks their titles to their names in the 

 catalogue of the Royal Soc."] 



