MANUAL WOEK : HOTHOUSE PESTS 429 
I read the history of the unctuous meeting of Philos. 
at Aberdeen and have read the severe remarks of barbarians 
on the toadying and tuft-hunting and buttering. Judging 
from titles of papers only, I should say there was never 
so much good matter in science brought to a head at once. 
Whilst you were sporting your science I was for 6 hours 
a day engaged in the philosophical pursuit of distributing 
86,000 duplicate named Indian plants. I liked it passably 
well ! I could think all the time and to some supposed 
purpose too. A good daily allowance of purely (or almost 
purely) manual work upon scientific materials is a most 
wholesome thing. I have thought my best thoughts when 
collecting and arranging, and now that I do not intend to 
collect or arrange any more, I find myself a fool for having 
snubbed these mechanical exercises that have secured the 
opportunities of opening up so many trains of ideas, that 
would otherwise never have fructified. 
Huxley had asked for specimens of some insect pests from 
the hot-houses of Kew. 
I send a brood or two of common mealbug, a piece of 
old cactus with Cochineal Cocci, and a few leaflets of a fern 
with f Scale insect ' on it. 
Fortunately we cannot supply you abundantly by this 
post, as my Father and I have had such rows with the 
foreman and gardeners about the prevalence of these beasts, 
that they are nowhere very abundant in our houses just 
at present. Asking us for Cocci is Hke asking a decent 
Boarding School Lady for a few crabs and other Pediculi 
from her pupils ! However for Science's sake we will for- 
give you. 
Unnecessary questions are a trial. He writes to Professor 
Henslow : 
January 20, 1855. 
Many thanks for your letter ; I have been bothered 
out of my Hfe with enquiries about Gynerium argenteum, 
and of all the yvvrjs she is the most troublesome. If 
altogether dizzy with his own and his neighbours' affairs, there was a grain of 
comfort : ' I have but one grim abiding source of satisfaction — I don't lecture 
and I never will.' 
