Alfred Russel Wallace 



you say, tedious work, it involves a considerable amount 

 of responsibility. Still, I am prepared to do any literary 

 worii of the kind, as I told Bates some time ago, and that 

 is the reason he wrote to me about it. I certainly think, 

 however, that it would be in many ways more satisfactory 

 to you if your son did it, and I therefore hope he may 

 undertake it. 



Should he, however, for any reasons, be unable, I am 

 at your service as a dernier ressort. 



In case my meaning is not quite clear, I will not do it 

 unless your son has the offer and declines it. — Believe me, 

 dear Darwin, yours very faithfully, Alfred E. Wallace. 



The Dell, Grays, Essex. Noveinber 18, 1873. 



Dear Darwin, — I quite understand what you require, 

 and would undertake to do it to the best of my ability. 

 Of course in such work I should not think of offering 

 criticisms of matter. 



I do not think I could form any idea of how long it 

 would take by seeing the MSS., as it would all depend 

 upon the amount of revision and working-in required. I 

 have helped Sir C. Lyell with his last three or four 

 editions in a somewhat similar though different way, and 

 for him I have kept an account simply of the hours I was 

 employed in any way for him, and he paid me 5/- an hour ; 

 but (of course this is confidential) I do not think this quite 

 enough for the class of work. I should propose for your 

 work 7/- an hour as a fair remuneration, and I would put 

 down each day the hours I worked at it. 



No doubt you will get it done for very much less by 

 any literary man accustomed to regular literary work and 

 nothing else, and perhaps better done, so do not in the 

 least scruple in saying you decide on employing the gentle- 

 man you had in view if you prefer it. 



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