116 DABWINIAN INTERESTS 



it all, nor shall I worry myself by telling anybody else any- 

 thing about it. I have written very little of it as yet, and I 

 will not go touting about for matter or illustrations. 



The work was completed under a great strain. His youngest 

 child nearly died. 



It did indeed make the Address repulsive [he writes on 

 July 29], but on the other hand it druv' me to it and made me 

 work. You know the horrid way a man who has his work 

 at home, loafs about the house when a child is ill. 



I have just concluded the rough sketch of what I shall 

 say (if not hissed down), for by George I would hiss anybody 

 who would eruct such stuff as I have written under any other 

 circumstances than a Presidential martyrdom. 



Apart from a description of the ideal organisation of a local 

 museum, such as that at Norwich, with its educational possi- 

 bilities before the still unattained epoch when teachers should 

 be trained in science, the main theme, as has been indicated, 

 was the progress of the ' Origin ' and an estimate of Darwin's 

 contributions to botany, alike in observation and in fertile 

 theory. For this task none was so .well qualified as Hooker 

 himself, and none could take greater pleasure in it. In the 

 1 Fertilisation of Orchids,' in the almost more wonderful dis- 

 coveries of the twofold and threefold mechanisms to ensure 

 cross-fertilisation in the primrose, the flax and the loosestrife, 

 and in the ' Habits and Movements of Climbing Plants,' he 

 found a wealth of observation which made the greatest of 

 living botanists ' feel that his botanical knowledge of these 

 homely plants had been but little deeper than Peter Bell's,' 

 while at the same time it opened up entirely new fields of 

 research and discovered new and important principles that 

 apply to the whole vegetable kingdom. 



Then, turning to Darwin's ' Animals and Plants under 

 Domestication,' so eagerly awaited as one of the pieces justifi- 

 catives of the ' Origin,' he exclaimed : 



It is hard to say whether this book is most remarkable 

 for the number and value of the new facts it discloses, or 

 for its array of small forgotten or overlooked observations, 



