6 . SPREAD OF EVOLUTION. [1863. 



after more than twenty years, to be as fresh as when it was 

 first received :] 



C. Darwin to Julius von Haast. 



Down, Jan. 22 [1863]. 



DEAR Sir, — I thank you most sincerely for sending me 

 your Address and the Geological Report* I have seldom in 

 my life read anything more spirited and interesting than your 

 address. The progress of your colony makes one proud, and 

 it is really admirable to see a scientific institution founded in 

 so young a nation. I thank you for the very honourable 

 notice of my ' Origin of Species.' You will easily believe 

 how much I have been interested by your striking facts on 

 the old glacial period, and I suppose the world might be 

 .searched in vain for so grand a display of terraces. You 

 have, indeed, a noble field for scientific research and dis- 

 ■covery. I have been extremely much interested by what you 

 .say about the tracks of supposed [living] mammalia. Might 

 I ask, if you succeed in discovering what the creatures are, 

 you would have the great kindness to inform me ? Perhaps 

 they may turn out something like the Solenhofen bird 

 creature, with its long tail and fingers, with claws to its 

 wings ! I may mention that in South America, in com- 

 pletely uninhabited regions, I found spring rat-traps, baited 

 with cheese, were very successful in catching the smaller 

 mammals. I would venture to suggest to you to urge on 

 some of the capable members of your institution to observe 

 annually the rate and manner of spreading of European 

 weeds and insects, and especially to observe what native 

 plants most fail ; this latter point has never been attended to. 

 Do the introduced hive-bees replace any other insect? &c. 

 All such points are, in my opinion, great desiderata in 



* Address to the ' Philosophical Zealand Government Gazette, Pro- 

 Institute of Canterbury (N.Z.).' vince of Canterbury, Oct. 1862. 

 The " Report " is given in the New 



