
          On Thursday last, I received yours of the 26th April, containing an
 account of Dr. Baldwin's manuscripts, now in your possession.  I was quite
 surprised, and equally gratified to learn that they as yet in being,
 and in such safe hands.  I had supposed they were lost, or, what
 I considered nearly the sam thing, gone to oblivion among the waste pa:
 per of his own family, or of the representatives of the late Mr. Collins.
 I have not seen the Dr's widow for a number of years, and do not know
 what has become of her and her daughters.  Although Mr. B. informed me, 
 himself, (what I knew before,) that the Doctor directed all his botanical papers
 & such part of his Herbarium as I should choose, to be delivered to me, -
 I readily discovered that she calculated on [turning?] them to some account,
 by a sale; and as I could not afford to give what I thought was the
 value of the Herbarium, I declined taking any portion of it, - and advised
 her to apply to Mr. Collins, who, I afterwards learnt, purchase it with a
 view to give it to the Philadelphia Academy.  Mr. B. did not even offer me
 the [M.S.S.?] - and I did not think proper to claim them.  After Mr. Collins'
 death, I accidentally saw a bos at Dr. Pickering's, containing some of Dr. Bald:
 wins plants, and a bundle of letters, directed to me, which I had lent to
 Dr. B. in 1818, to aid him in preparing his Florida Letters.  I told Dr. Pickering
 I should like to have those letters again; but he said they were lent to him
 by the representative of Mr. Collins - that said representative was going
 to sell them, along with the plants! and that I could not have them
 without that person's permission.  I made some caustic remarks, on the
 occasion, which Dr. P. repeated to the gentleman, - and he subsequently
 authorized Dr. P to return those letters to me.  The other papers of Dr. Baldwin's
 I never saw - and took it for granted they were not lost.  It is like
 a dream to me, tht you did, on some occasion, mention that you had
 some of Dr. B's papers or that you had seen them; but I cannot re:
 collect any particulars, - and I am confident I never had any of them
 in my possession - nor do I remember ever having seen them.  The
 circumstances to which you refer, had so entirely slipped my memory,
 that I suppose his letters to myself were the only ones now to be
 found; and hence it was,  that I transcribed them to submit to Dr.
 Gray.  I shall be extremely gratified to look over the collection of
 papers which you propose to send me; and I have no doubt many
 of them will be more interesting than some of those in my possession.
 But I am apprehensive it will be necessary to change the plan
 of the little project I had in view, - and that a full & proper
 compilation of the materials will be a task to which I am not
 adequate; and, moreover, swell the work much beyone the
 size I had contemplated.  I am afraid to trust my own
 judgement, in a labor of love of this description, - as I shall
 be in constant danger, in a copious mass of [Reliquise?], of
 preserving things which would interest no one but myself.
 I should certainly wish, if I published any of the Doctor's remains,

        