
          Dr. Torrey


 Please send me, in first parcel by express, as soon as 
 you well can, that largest of my Cambridge botanical 
 Illustrations, containing bulbs and [cones?], &c., on a 
 very long piece of cloth. This I think of using in Lowell 
 Lectures. You can retain the rest, I think, until the 1st of 
 March. (I have mentioned this in a letter sent 
 a day or two since)


 Dear [2b?], Mr. Greene has ascertained for me that 
 Pluchea is named in commemoration of 
 Noel Pluche, author of "Spectacle de la 
 Nature", etc. and other works. 


 Having occasion to smuggle a letter to 
 Wiley & Putnam into a parcel to New York, 
 I enclose this mem. [memoir] to you. Having so lately 
 written to you, I can think of nothing else to say, at 
 present.


 I have not received as yet the expected parcel 
 or letter from Mrs. Torrey, and am growing inpatient!


 I beg to offer the compliments of the season, an
 ex post facto merry Christmas.


 Yours cordially


 A. [Asa] Gray

        