a 862.] BOURNEMOUTH. 383 



1862. 



[Owing to the illness from scarlet fever of one of his boys, 

 he took a house at Bournemouth in the autumn. He wrote 

 to Dr. Gray from Southampton (Aug. 21, 1862) : 



"We are a wretched family, and ought to be exterminated. 

 We slept here to rest our poor boy on his journey to Bourne- 

 mouth, and my poor dear wife sickened with scarlet fever, 

 and has had it pretty sharply, but is recovering well. There 

 is no end of trouble in this weary world. I shall not feel safe 

 till we are all at home together, and when that will be I know 

 not. But it is foolish complaining." 



Dr. Gray used to send postage stamps to the scarlet fever 

 patient ; with regard to this good-natured deed my father 

 wrote 



" I must just recur to stamps ; my little man has calculated 

 that he will now have 6 stamps which no other boy in the 

 school has. Here is a triumph. Your last letter was 

 plaistered with many coloured stamps, and he long surveyed 

 the envelope in bed with much quiet satisfaction." 



The greater number of the letters of 1862 deal with the 

 Orchid work, but the wave of conversion to Evolution was 

 still spreading, and reviews and letters bearing on the subject 

 still came in numbers. As an example of the odd letters 

 he received may be mentioned one which arrived in January 

 of this year " from a German homoeopathic doctor, an ardent 

 admirer of the 'Origin.' Had himself published nearly 

 the same sort of book, but goes much deeper. Explains 

 the origin of plants and animals on the principles of ho- 

 moeopathy or by the law of spirality. Book fell dead in 

 Germany. Therefore would I translate it and publish it in 

 England."] 



