Thanks Royal Danish Academy for electing him as a Member, and for the kind expressions toward him from so many illustrious naturalists.

Research for Erasmus Darwin. CD has always thought there is one "golden rule" for biographers: "not to insert anything which … would interest only the members of the Family".

Sends thanks for "communicating the curious case of a habitual gesture, like that which I have treated as inherited. I may add that since I write, the action has been transmitted to another generation. Your case shall be sent to Mr Galton, who gave me the information".

Thanks for letter of introduction for Leonard Darwin to CMCD’s tenant at Elston.

Sends some information about R. W. Darwin’s residence at Elston; does not plan to include a portrait of him.

Asks the acreage of land at Cleatham.

Offers to send a print of the portrait of himself by W. W. Ouless.

Sends letters from RD’s father to R. W. Darwin.

Thanks for Haeckel’s Freedom in science and teaching [1879], with preface by THH.

Enjoyed rap on knuckles THH gives Rudolf Virchow.

Thanks him for his efforts. CD cared most about the letter to Thomas Okes [see Erasmus Darwin, pp. 14–15]. "Cannot think who the calumnious article cd have been about [in?] 1802."

Thanks for letter and articles: gratifying to hear that agriculturalists attend to his works.

Cannot decipher German writing so has stuck the address from the letter on the envelope.

Discusses his work on Dr Erasmus Darwin’s life.

Asks for identification of an Oxalis flower.

Asks for information about his grandfather’s influence on medical practice, to be used in his preface to Erasmus Darwin [1879, p. 107].

Thanks for information about Erasmus Darwin and for lending journal.

Admires EH’s Freie Wissenschaft und freie Lehre [1878].

Virchow’s conduct is shameful.

Thanks FG for an extract [about Dr Erasmus Darwin?].

CD is leaving home for three weeks’ rest. If EK finishes his life of Dr Darwin while CD is away, asks him to send the MS to W. S. Dallas for translation. CD will begin his preface, but needs rest and will not do much until he returns.

Leaves home on 6th for a rest.

Will commence writing Erasmus Darwin.

Apologises for keeping RD’s various books for so long a time.

Encourages JT’s experiments. His case of flowering of black potatoes is curious. CD surprised that they are odoriferous and visited by bees. This letter was thought to be to David Moore, because it was in the private collection of a descendant, but is extremely close to a draft to JT on the letter from JT, 30 April 1879 (DCP-LETT-12020). It is not known how it passed from JT to David Moore.

Asks GHD to look in Cambridge University Library for Monthly Magazine articles containing a malicious calumny concerning Dr [Erasmus] D[arwin] [see Erasmus Darwin, pp. 65–70].

Asks GHD to look for a life of Sir Henry Rayburn [Raeburn] "who is spoken of as famous and who painted Charles Darwin [1758–1778] when dead". Asks why he painted the corpse.

A big book arrived for GHD before CD left Down. Hopes it is Thomson and Tait [Treatise on natural philosophy, 2 vols., 2d ed. (1869)]. It shows what they think of GHD.

Thinks it grand if GHD has made a correction about "such an old sinner as the Sun" and hopes his arithmetic on his old subject will turn out right.