JDH thanks Mrs Mary Boott & her husband Dr Francis Boott for their letters. He associates the Boott's with his youngest sister Mary [Mary Harriet Hooker] who has died from consumption. He is glad to hear that his parents are in good health, he mentions a previous illness of his Father; Sir William Jackson Hooker. JDH is glad that Dr Boott is 'restored'. He is always glad to hear news of what is happening in London, especially in the arts, he comments specifically on the Chinese Exhibition at Hyde Park Corner, a cockney 'Skaiting' shop & skating trips to Margate. He discusses the formation of 'taste' regarding fine art, especially in the colonies where there are fewer example of good pictures. Whilst at sea JDH misses music & paintings, all their 'boxes' [accordions] are broken & the only music is his own whistling. Captain [James Clark] Ross remembers young Frank [Boott] from the Linnean Society. JDH is glad his descriptions of Antarctica entertained Mrs Boott, he explains that most of the time they are surrounded by a 'dreary waste of ice' sometimes enlivened by sights such as the erupting volcano Mt Erebus, the first sighting of which he recounts. He writes that to be an Antarctic voyager is to feel helpless, entirely dependent on a ship which is just a speck in a vast ice-scape. Since last writing JDH has been to Hermite Island near Cape Horn & to one of the Fuegian islands where he has found the winters mild compared to his expectations from the accounts of Joseph Banks & Dr Solander. He describes the cloudy atmosphere & luxuriant vegetation comparing it to the desolate Falkland Islands. Describes sailing under the cliff of Cape Horn which was covered in Fuegian Beeches. Describes the dramatic hills of Fuegia.