360 GEOEGE JOHN EOMANES 1893 



more than climatic influences, to which their proto- 

 plasm may respond. The result is new varietal or 

 specific characters. Then, if the same environment 

 lasts, these become gradually more and more fixed 

 and hereditary, but one can never tell beforehand but 

 that the oldest plant in creation may not change 

 again as soon as it finds a new environment. . . . 

 This is what a long study of plants and experiments 

 has led me to ; and it is not a conclusion arrived at 

 solely by ' thinking out ' or evolving from my own 

 consciousness like the German camel ! 

 Hoping you are progressing, 



Believe me, yours sincerely, 



GEOEGE HEN SLOW. 



Hotel I'Ermitage, Costebelle, Hyeres, France : October 29, 1893. 



Dear Mr. Henslow, You will correctly infer from 

 this address that I shall not be able to attend the 

 Linnean Society meeting on the 16th prox. For two 

 or three years past my health has been breaking up, 

 and several months ago I had a stroke of paralysis. 

 So I have had to knock off all work, and have just 

 arrived here to spend the winter finding your letter, 

 forwarded from Oxford, awaiting me. 



It has interested me very much, and some time 

 I should like to see the paper to which it refers, 

 whether in MS. or print. As far as I can gather, 

 you are spontaneously following in the footsteps of 

 Asa Gray, Nageli, and some other botanists. But, it 

 seems to me, this self-adaptation doctrine is equi- 

 valent to an a priori abandoning of all hope to obtain 

 any naturalistic explanation of the phenomena in 



