Discusses manuscript by H. W. Bates [Naturalist on the river Amazons (1863)].

Mentions CD’s forthcoming book [Orchids].

Returns "The Week" [unidentified].

Agrees with THH’s published letter that writer is a man of excellent spirit, but doubts he is a good logician.

CD returns a paper he has received through [G. B.?] Sowerby. He wishes he could persuade his correspondent to publish papers on such subjects. The series on brachiopods was very striking.

Suggests that the height of the water which formed the shelves in Glen Roy was determined not by the height of the blocking glacier but by the height of a col. Notes problems in the idea.

Explains how melting of ice in Glen Spean could have successively freed two lower cols, thus establishing the water-levels that determined the two lower shelves in Glen Roy.

Plans to read a paper to the Linnean Society ["Sexual forms of Catasetum", Collected papers 2: 63–70].

Asks for information about japanned peacocks from Hudson [John Henry?] Gurney’s flock.

Asks for information about peacocks, especially Pavo nigripennis. Suggests a crossing experiment.

Encloses a question [missing] concerning language [from Hensleigh Wedgwood].

Refers to his Primula paper [Collected papers 2: 45–63]. Asks GHKT to investigate a similar case in Cinchona.

Testimonial in support of WBT’s application for curatorship of the Hartley Institution.

Asks for information concerning heterostyled and dioecious plants.

Thanks JB for "orchid flowers with Diptera".

CD has been experimenting on the fertility of peloric flowers, with the forlorn hope of illustrating sterility of hybrids; seeks further plants or seeds.

CD grateful to have had the distinction of the two sorts of peloria pointed out to him.

His very sick son rallied; is out of danger, thanks to port wine.

Relates personal news about family members.

CD is "glad Glen Roy is settled".

Mentions evolutionary remarks on birds by Owen.

Compares variability among lower and higher organisms. Comments on Hooker’s view of the subject.

Forthcoming publication of Huxley’s book [Evidence as to man’s place in nature (1863)] and Lyell’s [Antiquity of man (1863)].

Family news; mostly an account of ill health.

Mentions a discussion of man by Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire in his Histoire naturelle générale [1854–62].

Mentions a book by Friedrich Rolle [Ch. Darwin’s Lehre von der Entstehung der Arten (1863)].

Cites evolutionary statements on elephants by Hugh Falconer and notes Falconer’s objection to natural selection.

Further comments on Jamieson’s theory of the formation of the roads of Glen Roy; paper by Jamieson dealing with glaciation in Scotland ["On the ice-worn rocks of Scotland", Q. J. Geol. Soc. Lond. 18 (1862): 164–84].

Comments on paper by A. C. Ramsay on the glacial formation of lakes ["On the glacial origin of certain lakes", Q. J. Geol. Soc. Lond. 18 (1862): 185–204].

Criticises remarks by John Tyndall on glacial formation of Swiss valleys.

Asks for information about cases for stove-plants. [Answers recorded in another hand.]

CD sends thanks for Manual of European butterflies [1862].

Is pleased that WFK does not believe in immutability of species, "a doctrine perfectly adapted to stop philosophical research", and hopes he will publish further.

Notes WFK’s name is the same as the entomologist’s.