Describes Infusoria in Rio Gallegos samples.
"Fluthgebiete" means estuary deposit.
Discusses dust samples from Malta. Asks for further samples.
Agrees with JDH about Forbes’s views.
Discusses A. Saint-Hilaire’s lectures and asks on what grounds botanists judge the relative "highness" of plants.
C. G. Ehrenberg wants specimen grasses from Ascension Island.
Sends copy [of "Fine dust in the Atlantic Ocean", Collected papers 1: 199–202]. Attempting to obtain further samples for CGE.
JDH recognises the existence of "altered states" of continental species in island floras. The botanists’ difficulty in determining a new species is no grounds for dismissing the important question of altered forms.
Will look for Ascension plants for Ehrenberg.
French Galapagos collections confirm JDH’s view that plants arrived from north.
Cannot agree with Forbes on North Atlantic flora.
Botanical definition of "highness" and "lowness" usually means complexity and simplicity.
Some plants, such as aquatic ones, are cleistogamous. Cannot see why they should not be.
If JDH can send grasses CD will write to Ehrenberg enclosing them.
Sends specimens of grasses from Ascension Island for CD to forward to Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg.
Includes list of indigenous flowering plants of Ascension Island.
Discusses publication of his book [South America].
Sends a list of mammalian remains found in the Buenos Aires district and purchased by the British Museum.
Thanks for the gift of Frémont 1845. Has had a visit from R. J. Mackintosh and his wife Mary, Appleton’s sister.
Thanks for his note; as soon as CD knows how many Cordillera Tertiary fossil shells require illustration he will make arrangements for GBS jr to begin.
Returns copy [of J. Hortic. Soc. Lond.]. Mentions article by William Herbert ["Local habitation and wants of plants", J. Hortic. Soc. Lond. 1 (1846): 44–9].
On geological works of Tschudi and Buch.
"My health keeps indifferent & I do not suppose I shall ever be a strong man again: everything fatigues me, & I can work but little at my writing: this summer, however, I shall get out my geology of S. America".
"I found Bronn’s Geschichte, which you recommended me, very useful, for references to facts on variation".
Is pleased JDH will attend to polymorphism and also with the botanical relation, as stated by JDH, between Africa and Java.
Would welcome any information on impregnation in the bud.
Hugh Falconer gives no specific objections to Forbes’s views.
Botanical contrast between Cape of Good Hope and the rest of Africa is as strong as that between Australia and India.
Wishes CD would leave off snuff.
CD’s suggestions for improving a paragraph by JDH.
On distribution of certain species and their variation relative to a central, typical form.
Asks to visit RO to talk about mammifers of the [Rio] Plata.
Writes concerning CD’s "geometrico-geological problem". Attempts to square some of CD’s observations with certain geometrical theories concerning geological elevation.
Interested in sterility of alpine plants in lowland and sterility of some plants in cultivation.
Curious to see Galapagos paper.
Discussion of CD’s geological problem, relating to elevation of laminated beds around a rising granitic ridge.