33§ BOTANY [Chap. XI 



Letter 662 The vases x did come from my sister Susan. She is 

 recovering, and was much pleased to hear that you liked 

 them ; I have now sent one of your notes to her, in which 

 you speak of them as " enchanting," etc. I have had a 

 bad spell — vomiting, every day for eleven days, and some 

 days many times after every meal. It is astonishing the 

 degree to which I keep up some strength. Dr. Brinton was 

 here two days ago, and says he sees no reason [why] I may 

 not recover my former degree of health. I should like to live 

 to do a little more work, and often I feel sure I shall, and 

 then again I feel that my tether is run out. 



Your Hastings note, my dear old fellow, was a Copley 

 Medal 2 to me and more than a Copley Medal : not but what 

 I know well that you overrate what I have been able to do. 

 Now that I am disabled, I feel more than ever what a pleasure 

 observing and making out little difficulties is. By the way, 

 here is a very little fact which may interest you. A partridge 

 foot is described in Proc. Zoolog. Soc? with a huge ball of 

 earth attached to it as hard as rock. Bird killed in i860. 

 Leg has been sent me, and I find it diseased, and no doubt 

 the exudation caused earth to accumulate ; now already 

 thirty-two plants have come up from this ball of earth. 



By Jove ! I must write no more. Good-bye, my best of 

 friends. 



There is an Italian edition of the Origin preparing. This 

 makes the fifth foreign edition — i.e. in five foreign countries. 

 Owen will not be right in telling Longmans that the book 

 would be utterly forgotten in ten years. Hurrah ! 



Letter 663 To D - 01iver - 



Down, Feb. 17th [1864]. 



Many thanks for the Epacrids, which I have kept, as they 

 will interest me when able to look through the microscope. 



Dr. Criiger has sent me the enclosed paper, with power to 

 do what I think fit with it. He would evidently prefer it 

 to appear in the Nat. Hist. Review. Please read it, and 



1 Probably Wedgwood ware. 



2 The proposal to give the medal to Darwin failed in 1863, but his 

 friends were successful in 1864 : see Life and Letters, III., p. 28. 



3 Proc. Zool. Soc, 1863, p. 127, by Prof. Newton, who sent the foot to 

 Darwin : see Origin, Ed. VI., p. 328. 



