The Wallace-Darwin Correspondence 



I presume read, by deputy. My little article on Haughton's 

 paper was published in the Annals of Natural History about 

 August or September last, I think, but I have not a copy to 

 refer to. I am sure it does not deserve Asa Gray's praises, 

 for though the matter may be true enough, the manner I 

 know is very inferior. It was written hastily, and when I 

 read it in the Annals I was rather ashamed of it, as I knew 

 so many could have done it so much better. 



I will try and see Agassiz's paper and book. What I have 

 hitherto seen of his on Glacial subjects seems very good, but 

 in all his Natural History theories y he seems so utterly wrong 

 and so totally blind to the plainest deduction from facts, and 

 at the same time so vague and obscure in his language, that 

 it would be a very long and wearisome task to answer him. 



With regard to work, I am doing but little — I am 

 afraid I have no good habit of systematic w^ork. I have 

 been gradually getting parts of my collections in order, but 

 the obscurities of synonymy and descriptions, the difficulty 

 of examining specimens, and my very limited library, make 

 it wearisome work. 



I have been lately getting the first groups of my butter- 

 flies in order, and they offer some most interesting facts in 

 variation and distribution — in variation some very puzzling 

 ones. Though I have very fine series of specimens, I find 

 in many cases I want more; in fact if I could have 

 afforded to have all my collections kept till my return I 

 should, I think, have found it necessary to retain twice as 

 many as I now have. 



I am at last making a beginning of a small book on my 

 Eastern journey, which, if I can persevere, I hope to have 

 ready by next Christmas. I am a very bad hand at writing 

 anything like narrative. I want something to argue on, and 

 then I find it much easier to go ahead. I rather despair, 

 therefore, of making so good a book as Bates's, though I 



149 



