c866.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION. 231 



observed it. Again, I agree that I have said too much about 

 "favourable variations; " but I am inclined to think that you 

 put the opposite side too strongly ; if every part of every 

 being varied, I do not think we should see the same end, or 

 object, gained by such wonderfully diversified means. 



I hope you are enjoying the country, and are in good 

 health, and are working hard at your Malay Archipelago book, 

 for I will always put this wish in every note I write to you, 

 like some good people always put in a text. My health keeps 

 much the same, or rather improves, and I am able to work 

 some hours daily. With many thanks for your interesting 

 letter. 



Believe me, my dear Wallace, yours sincerely, 



CH. DARWIN. 



C. Darwin to J. D. Hooker. 



Down, Aug. 30 [1866]. 



MY DEAR HOOKER, I was very glad to get your note 

 and the Notts. Newspaper. I have seldom been more pleased 

 in my life than at hearing how successfully your lecture * 

 went off. Mrs. H. Wedgwood sent us an account, saying 

 that you read capitally, and were listened too with profound 

 attention and great applause. She says, when your final 

 allegory f began, " for a minute or two we were all mystified, 

 and then came such bursts of applause from the audience. 

 It was thoroughly enjoyed amid roars of laughter and noise, 

 making a most brilliant conclusion." 



I am rejoiced that you will publish your lecture, and felt 

 sure that sooner or later it would come to this, indeed^it 



* At the Nottingham meeting of the British Association, Aug. 27, 1866. 

 The subject of the lecture was ' Insular Floras.' See Gardener's Chronicle, 

 1866. 



f Sir Joseph Hooker allegorized the Oxford meeting of the British 

 Association as the gathering of a tribe of savages who believed that the 

 new moon was created afresh each month. The anger of the priests and 

 medicine man at a certain heresy, according to which the new moon is but 

 the offspring of the old one, is excellently given. 



