Asks for specimen of Orchis pyramidalis for his work on insect fertilisation of orchids.

Thanks GB for specimen [of Orchis pyramidalis].

Discusses a great difficulty with orchids: "Insects visit several species which never secrete an atom of honey." [See Orchids, p. 44ff.] Does GB know whether nectar is ever secreted and reabsorbed promptly?

Bentham has sent a damaged spurless Orchis pyramidalis; asks CL to send another. Fears they are irregular monsters. [See Orchids, pp. 47–8.]

Thanks JL for identifying Catasetum saccatum.

Writes of his interest ("more than almost anything in my life") in orchids, but fears he is rash to publish.

Sends thanks for an informative letter;

would be grateful for any orchids; names some he would particularly like.

CD is sending an orchid flower; asks JL to identify it.

Also asks if JL can spare a dried flower of another orchid (name forgotten) [which CD describes] so that he can try to trace its ducts or spiral vessels.

Thanks GB for arranging for his paper ["Two forms of Primula", Collected papers 2: 45–63] and for his photograph.

CD sends thanks for many valuable dried specimens [of orchids]. Has been promised Catasetum and some Dendrobium by Mr Rucker; has written also to Lady Dorothy [Nevill].

Lady Dorothy [Nevill] has written very obligingly and sent a lot of orchids.

Requests more precise details about Oxalis, to which GB referred in his remarks on Primula.

Would prefer to have Primula paper published in the Linnean Society’s Journal rather than Transactions.

Thanks GB for valuable letter [3331].

Will follow his suggestion about violets.

Discusses differences between Thymus and Primula.

Thanks JL for a flower of Bolbophyllum, a genus that puzzles him.

Recent work has convinced him a number of orchids are male. Points out that JL [in The vegetable kingdom (1846), pp. 177–8] "accidentally misquoted" R. H. Schomburgk on this point.

Delayed thanking JL for two notes until he heard from Hooker about Acropera luteola; had no idea A. luteola was not a well-known name.

Cites his reasons for identifying A. loddigesii as male; hopes for a Gongora flower from Hooker which, JL suggested, may be the female.

Thanks JL for information about Acropera luteola.

Also thanks for the Gongora; cannot avoid the impression it is male.

Asks GB’s help to clear up discrepancies between his and John Lindley’s observations on pollination of Melastomataceae.

Will try to come to Linnean Society to read his paper, but has been "extra headachy". Fears his paper ["Sexual forms of Catasetum", Collected papers 2: 63–70] will not be worth Lindley’s attendance.

Thanks JL for review [of Orchids, Gard. Chron. (1862): 789–90, 863]; CD published almost by accident, having been led on in part by encouragement from JL.

Asks for reference to GB’s summary of Targioni-Tozzetti’s book ["Historical notes on the introduction of various plants into the agriculture and horticulture of Tuscany: a summary of a work entitled Cenni storici sulla introduzione di varie piante nell agricultura ed orticultura Toscana by Dr Antonio Targioni-Tozzetti, Florence, 1850", J. Hortic. Soc. Lond. 9 (1855): 133–81]. [See Variation, 1st ed., 1: 306 n.]

Sends Asa Gray letter: "nearly as mad as ever in our English eyes".

Bates’s paper is admirable. The act of segregation of varieties into species was never so plainly brought forth.

CD is a little sorry that his present work is leading him to believe rather more in the direct action of physical conditions. Regrets it because it lessens the glory of natural selection and is so confoundedly doubtful.

JDH laid too much stress on importance of crossing with respect to origin of species; but certainly it is important in keeping forms stable.

If only Owen could be excluded from Council of Royal Society Falconer would be good to put in. CD must come down to London to see what he can do.

Falconer’s article in Journal of the Geological Society [18 (1862): 348–69] shows him coming round on permanence of species, but he does not like natural selection.

Sends Lythrum salicaria diagram.