
          work them up himself he will most assuredly be anticipated
 in many of them. And the ultimate result would be
 a perfect Wilkes failure, at least so far as the botany is 
 concerned. I have much [added: been] annoyed by the want of
 paper from the beginning. I am also somewhat cramped
 in my perambulations from the necessity of attending to
 my official duties as Surgeon of the Commission.
 Books, Papers, and other Publications especially on the Botany
 of this Country are rare as "birds teeth" and much needed by
 us out here. I should be ten thousand times obliged 
 by you and will more over remunerate you well if you
 would send me immediately all the new publications
 of Western plants that you can procure. I started
 with Emory's & Fremont's Reports but unfortunately have
 lost them both. The only books I now have are Gray's
 Botanical Text Book, Lindley's Introductions (old London
 edition), and Humboldt's Views of Nature. Your
 New Genera of Fremontian Plants will most assuredly 
 be truly and gratefully welcome should they be so fortunate
 as to come safely to hand. I wanted to get hold
 of Lindley's Vegetable Kingdom but was unable to procure
 it before I left home. If it were possible I should
 be glad also to get a copy of your Flora of N. [North] America.
 I have a copy at home in Ohio but do not know
 how to get it out here. The pamphlets and unbound 
 books it appears to me could be sent by mail and if
 you could mail them at New York in time to reach 
 San Antonio before the 1st of May next at which time
 a mail leaves there for this place I could certainly get them.  
        