Asks FD to mollify Daniel Oliver and assure him that CD asks "only for what I wd. give my life’s blood for".

JDH reports on Frank’s reading of his Dipsacus paper at the Royal Society. Huxley slept through much of it, but JDH is well pleased with it.

CD counters Thiselton-Dyer’s objection to protoplasmic filaments of Dipsacus protruding beyond cell-wall, as Frank’s paper claims, by citing white "blood cells passing through vessels".

Has received Moseley’s collection of photographs.

Has read in the newspapers about the album of photographs of German scientists sent in tribute to CD. His name and photograph are missing only because he was not asked to participate. CC assures CD he is one of his ardent supporters.

Thanks for Orchids [2d ed.].

Does not feel his abstract of Cross and self-fertilisation [Am. J. Sci. 3d ser. 13 (1877): 125–41] was thorough enough.

Has heard of their sad bereavement last autumn [death of Amy, wife of Francis Darwin].

Asks CD to publish in Nature JGFR’s observation that natives of Hainan have movable tail bones up to 4 cm long.

As editor of the new journal, Kosmos, thanks CD for the permission he has granted Ernst Haeckel to publish with CD’s approval.

Cites his long support for evolution as exemplified by his book [Die botanische Systematik in ihrem Verhältniss zur Morphologie (1866)].

CD has many German supporters.

Discusses the cleistogamous flowers of Oxalis. Thinks they may not be truly cleistogamous but merely arrested or imperfectly developed normal flowers.

Sends belated birthday greetings

and an archaeological pamphlet.

Asks for CD’s autograph.

Fertilisation of orchids. Believes some plants so constituted as to dispense with cross-fertilisation.

Thinks flowers of Hottonia project from the stem nearly horizontally, perhaps slightly upwards.

Sorry that he cannot help with Pulmonaria angustifolia.

Oliver cannot, as CD has requested, hunt for trimorphic flowers in the Herbarium’s collection of Oxalis specimens. He would help Frank if he comes.

Regrets he cannot help on Oxalis question. He did not note the names of species with cleistogamic flowers as he thought they were sufficiently known.

Pangenesis supports the existence of gemmules; does not accept Galton’s experiments as disproving their existence or importance.

The editor of the Agricultural Gazette asks CD to settle a point being debated in his journal. Can a desirable breed of cattle, which is so inbred as to have scrofula, be maintained by crossing with a breed of healthy constitution?

CD apologises for his burdensome request of Oliver.

Criticises JDH’s notice on Forsythia, which JDH said was dioecious. Forsythia sent to CD from Kew was heterostylous.

A curious error – too late to change: in Cross and self-fertilisation CD has "cleistogenous" for "cleistogamous" flowers throughout.

Thanks CD for new [2d] edition of Orchids.

Mentions some observations on dimorphic plants.

Reports on a third species of Pontederia [see Forms of flowers, p. 185].

Describes some unusual grasses.

Reports rumours from southern Brazil concerning the existence of a gigantic subterranean animal.

Proposes to construct an aquarium on Jersey and wants to use CD’s name in support of the project.

Regrets he cannot permit his name to be used to support WSK’s aquarium project. If WSK decides to set up an aquarium solely for scientific purposes he would consider subscribing.