Thanks BJS for account of Mendoza earthquake.

FitzRoy sent CD the last London Review [& Weekly J. Polit.] and he read the article on Genesis, but feels it is an attempt to reconcile the irreconcilable.

Would rejoice to see BJS at Down, but explains that he can only spend short spells of time in his company if he comes.

Thanks BJS for his account of S. America and the Fuegians.

Can BJS ask W. H. Stirling to make observations on expression?

Has asked Hooker about the fossil leaves, and he suggests they be sent to Oswald Heer.

Has just sent MS on domestic animals [Variation] to the printer.

Thanks BJS for W. H. Stirling’s answers [to queries about expression]

and for information on cattle and breeding of dogs.

CD thanks BJS for photographs of Jemmy [Button]’s son

and for the curious case about stallions, which leads him to ask whether BJS has observed that horses when fighting try especially to bite each other’s necks.

Does he know anything about male seals fighting?

Congratulates BJS on his K.C.B.

In autumn he will publish a book partly on man [Descent], which he expects "many will decry as very wicked".

Thinks the success of the Tierra del Fuego mission is wonderful.

Thanks BJS for a journal and an interesting letter.

Thanks BJS for his congratulations [on Leonard Darwin’s success].

CD is "as usual, always ailing and grumbling".

Expects his new book [Descent] to "disgust you & many others".

Thanks BJS for his interesting letter about parrots and language.

Suggests BJS write to Louis Agassiz about his [fossil mammal?] specimens but doubts that he will have time to do the work. Regrets they were ignored at the Royal College of Surgeons; thinks Owen neglected many things because he was overworked.

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".