122 WORK ON 'MAN.' [187O. 



my unbounded admiration of the woodcuts. I fairly gloat 

 over them. The only evil is that they will make all the other 

 woodcuts look very poor! They are all excellent, and for 

 the feathers I declare I think it the most wonderful woodcut 

 I ever saw ; I cannot help touching it to make sure that it is 

 smooth. How I wish to see the two other, and even more 

 important, ones of the feathers, and the four [of] reptiles, &c. 

 Once again accept my very sincere thanks for all your kind- 

 ness. I am greatly indebted to Mr. Ford. Engravings have 

 always hitherto been my greatest misery, and now they are a 

 real pleasure to me. 



Yours very sincerely, 



Ch. Darwin. 



P.S. — I thought I should have been in press by this time, 

 but my subject has branched off into sub-branches, which 

 have cost me infinite time, and heaven knows when I shall 

 have all my MS. ready ; but I am never idle. 



C. Darwin to A . Giinther. 



May 15 [1870]. 



My dear Dr. GtJNTHER, — Sincere thanks. Your answers 

 are wonderfully clear and complete. I have some analogous 

 questions on reptiles, &c, which I will send in a few days, and 

 then I think I shall cause no more trouble. I will get the 

 books you refer me to. The case of the Solenostoma * is 

 magnificent, so exactly analogous to that of those birds in 

 which the female is the more gay, but ten times better for me, 

 as she is the incubator. As I crawl on with the successive 



* In most of the Lophobranchii But in Solenostoma the female is 



the male has a marsupial sack in the hatcher, and is also the more 



which the eggs are hatched, and in brightly coloured. — ' Descent of 



these species the male is slightly Man,' ii. 21. 

 brighter coloured than the female. 



