Thanks BJS for the missionary pamphlet and his good account of the Fuegians.

Is under the care of Andrew Clark, and feels "very old & helpless".

Asks about insects and seeds on leaves of Pinguicula.

Thanks JDH for Asa Gray’s interesting letter.

Would like JDH’s copy of Coral reefs. Needs it for corrections for a new edition. Cannot buy one.

Pleased they will publish a new edition of Coral reefs, and he will soon consider any addenda and write a short preface.

Will return the wood-blocks of Journal of Researches the following week.

Could his copy of Coral Reefs please be returned.

CD is glad Horace has done "pretty well" in his examination.

Smith and Elder will publish new edition of Coral reefs [1874]; thanks HD for aid.

Invites AC to visit.

CD requests WW to ask a large breeder of greyhounds whether the increase in litters requires that some puppies be destroyed. If so, is it sufficient to destroy merely the small and weak? Would this result in more males or females being destroyed?

CD once used the Field to tabulate ratios of female to male births in greyhounds (110: 100).

Has read TNS’s article ["On the geography and recent volcanic eruption of the Sandwich Islands", J. R. Geogr. Soc. 38 (1868): 361–9].

Asks for information on decline in population and infanticide in the Sandwich Islands. Seeks corroboration of A. Bishop’s reports.

The coral-reef book has been invaluable [J. D. Dana, Corals and coral islands (1872); used by CD in Coral reefs, 2d ed. (1874)].

Thanks for Saturday Review.

Seeks information on the number of Pitcairn islanders and the effect on their fertility of the transfer to Norfolk Island.

Reports on a séance. "The Lord have mercy on us all if we have to believe in such rubbish."

Asks JDH to vote for his nephew, Henry Parker, for Athenaeum membership.

Finds from the Colonial Office that a census [of the Pitcairn Islands?] is expected soon, from which he will get the information he desires. [See 9241 and 9246.]

Would like recipient to ask inmates whether they are offspring of cousin marriages.

Is glad to hear of new German edition of Descent, but owing to his extensive revisions, corrected sheets will not be ready for about three months.

Is working on a new edition of Coral reefs, which he thinks would sell in Germany.

Would like to hear "out of curiosity & vanity" how many copies of his books have been sold in Germany.

Asks for information about the title and date of Semper’s essay disputing CD’s theory of coral reefs.

Has ordered James Clerk Maxwell’s book [On the stability of the motion of Saturn’s rings (1859)] as a present for Sofya Kovalevsky.

Discusses THH’s account of the séance. CD convinced all are fraudulent.

Do breeders rear more male than female greyhound puppies?

Orders five works on the Sandwich Islands from the Royal Geographical Society Library for his investigation of infanticide and population trends there.

Prefaces Fritz Müller’s observations on termites and stingless bees [see 9281].