510 LETTERS TO DARWIN AND OTHERS. [1863, 
fashion, and send me your fresh and stimulating let- 
ters, whenever you are in the mood of it. am now 
in my vacation, and already, having idled and dawdled 
a week or two, Iam as well and eng as possible, 
and in the best of spirits. We should leave home 
this week for three weeks’ run in the country, but the 
sickness of my wife’s nephew, Lieutenant Jackson of 
Massachusetts Cavalry, will keep us awhile, as, though 
not alarming, it might take a bad turn, and so I may 
not be in the country for a week or two yet. We 
shall see. . . 
I have ene and fresh Drosera rotundifolia, and 
it will now turn in its bristles and stick the viscid 
gland fast to a fly, binding him fast on all sides with 
liliputian cords. But it is awfully slow about it, — 
say three or four hours, and the next day the leaf 
sometimes becomes involute and folds over or curves 
around the insect; but what good? If the fly is not 
stuck fast in alighting, no movement takes place to 
hold him till he has got away if he ever could. How- 
ever, it is an indication of what is so effectually done 
in Dionza,. 
Rotary movement of end of tendril-bearing stems 
is common, is it not, and well-known ? 
Any notes you will give me to print in “ Silliman’s 
Journal,” I shall always delight in. 
I have been reading Owen’s Aye-aye paper. Well, 
this is rich and cool! Did I not tell you in the “ At- 
lantic,” long ago, that Owen had a transmutation 
theory of his-own! It is your Hamlet, with the part 
of Hamlet left out! But as you say now, you don’t 
so much insist on natural selection, if you can only 
have derivation of species. And Owen goes in for 
derivation on the largest scale. You may as well 
lovingly embrace! Oh, it is rare fun! ... 
