
          I doubt if I have taken an oyster dinner since we went
 together to your (!) shop in the Bowery. But I have had my
 eye on a (very decent looking) establishment in this neighbourhood,
 where they write up-- "The friends of good oysters meet here"--
 Undoubtably we are of that body politic-- but, I have no pretension
 to vie with you in that matter, as I do not eat them 3
 times a day! I wonder whether you have any of the kind of 
 teeth with which the old [cestrationidoe?] & Saurians were furnished,
 for the purpose of devouring molluscs shells and all!
 They may not be fully develop'd but doubtless your [Ostraverous?]
 jaws, carefully examined by [Richard] Owen-- or our friend [Louis] Agassiz--
 would exhibit the rudiments of such instruments-- of which
 your inordinate propensities at once suggest the need!


 And now dear Oyster-Eater to your queries--


 1. I sent my small package to [William Arnold] Bromfield, 4 weeks since,
 thro' [Francis] Boott.
 2. I cannot take a family of plants to work up just now,
 first, because, having refused [Asa] Gray, he might justly be angry 
 with me, for so doing; & secondly, becuse I have just
 begun to examine & lay out my Gramina [Gramineae], for gluing,
 which, as they have not hitherto been carefully overhauled, 
 is a long & labourious work. This tribe, & the Cyps. [Cypereae? Cyperus?]
 thanks to our friend Gray's rich stores, & liberality, constitute
 the strength of my new Herb. [Herbarium] & I wish to get what
 I have in working order, as soon as I can. I am not
 over-fond of so mechanical a job, & get on very slowly,
 but I have some little incidental study, which enlivens
 the dreariness of the work, in some degree.
 3. Bring any little family you, yourself, may fancy
 for work whilst we are together. I am rather fresh in
 Junci [Juncus? Juncaceae?]-- if you have not yet worked them up. I have been
        