At Asa Gray’s request, responds to CD’s questions about WMC’s observations on Dionaea and particularly about the size of the insects captured and the excitability of the leaves after an insect is captured.

Has no corrections for second German edition [of Expression]. Plans to bring out an improved edition in a year or two.

Thanks for reference JVC sent.

Thanks for Chapman 1873 (Chapman, John. 1873. Neuralgia and kindred diseases of the nervous system).

He does not accept Wallace’s definition of instinct because it excludes "inherited experience", i.e., "knowledge acquired by and transmitted through ancestors".

House-flies do not seem to have an instinctive fear of trap-door spiders.

Miss Forster gives him news of CD.

A letter of recommendation for W. B. Dawkins in his application for the Woodwardian professorship of geology in the university of Cambridge.

Thanks for J. D. MacDonald’s paper ["Distribution of invertebrata", Proc. R. Soc. Lond. 21 (1872–3): 218–23].

CD feels lines of genetic connection between animals offer a most difficult problem; Ernst Haeckel may have done mischief by facing the difficulty.

Is glad JEG has made out what the guemul is ["On the Guémul", Ann. & Mag. Nat. Hist. 4th ser. 10 (1872): 445–6; 11 (1873): 214–20, 308–10].

Thanks his Italian colleague for articles on the skull of a chimpanzee.

Cannot find a publisher for Italian translation of Expression. Gives up the project.

Would like a museum set up illustrating origins, varieties, and uses of domestic animals; seeks CD’s approval of the idea.

Forwards Matthew Arnold’s Literature and dogma [1873].

Hopes they can secure Hooker for President of Royal Society.

Thanks MA for his Literature and dogma [1873].

Encloses cheque for 1000 guineas, CD’s share of profits on first 7000 copies of Expression.

Thinks FBG’s idea of a room at the British Museum of domestic birds and animals an excellent one, but a collection of plants would be much more difficult.

Is sorry that CIFM has had to give up translating Expression into Italian.

Sends a letter from William Huggins about a case of inherited fright in three generations of mastiffs. Discusses the different origins of instincts and their inheritance.

Gives a case of peculiar behaviour in cats that apparently is inherited.

Remarks on the "grief-muscles" shown in a Dürer picture.

Returns family documents about "Kepler" [William Huggins’ dog, see Collected papers 2: 170–1]; there is still some sort of investigation into the "precise mental condition" of "Kepler" and his relatives.

Is drawing up the account of his crossing experiments. Requests JDH to add the families after nine genera, the names of which he encloses. Whenever there is no objection he would like to arrange the families in some sort of natural order.

Recommends Spalding’s article on instinct in Macmillan’s Magazine [27 (1873): 265–81].