The niata is a very good case because the race is well established and must originate in South America. There is a description of the head by [Richard] Owen in the Descriptive catalogue of the osteological collection of the College of Surgeons.

Has observed modifications in the skeletons of rabbits, ducks, poultry, and pigeons. There is an extract about modifications in pigeons in the first chapter of Origin. Encloses a woodcut of crested or polish fowls; there is a change in the brain as well as in the exterior bones.

Difference in plumage of Ardeola, a species of heron, in summer and winter. [See Descent 2: 190.]

Thanks for information on Primula ovules. From what DO says the pollen-tubes ought to find their way to the micropyle.

Discusses the repayment of a loan made by CD to DTA and F. Ransome.

Sends GB a selection of reviews of the Origin from his collection of about 90, with his opinion of some of them.

Discusses having skull photographed and a cast made.

Thinks CD’s letter ["The doctrine of heterogeny", Collected papers 2: 78–80] will appear "with a clearer field and to better effect" if delayed a week, since next issue [of Athenæum] has Lyell’s reply to Hugh Falconer, and W. B. Carpenter’s report on the Abbéville jaw.

No summary available.

Has done Primula polyanthus experiment CD suggested.

Was unable to see Ransome [to find out whether DTA’s shares in the patent had earned any income so he could repay CD] but believes Ransome’s work will be profitable. Bemoans his own constant financial misfortune and asks CD to give up the deed of his loan to him, on the promise that if the shares ever yield any income, CD will be paid.

No summary available.

Likes JDH’s review of Alphonse de Candolle [Mémoires et souvenirs de A. P. de Candolle (1862)].

Falconer’s article on Lyell ["Primitive man. What led to the question?", Athenæum 4 Apr 1863, pp. 459–60] too severe.

CD has written a letter to the Athenæum "to say, under the cloak of attacking Heterogeny, a word in my own defence" [Collected papers 2: 78–80].

Bates’s Travels [Naturalist on the river Amazons (1863)] are excellent.

Attacks the doctrine of "heterogeny" (spontaneous generation during each geological period) as completely lacking in evidence.

Defends natural selection as connecting large classes of facts in natural history. That certain forms have not changed since remote epochs is not an objection of any force.

Has finished vol. 1 [of Naturalist on the river Amazons]. CD praises book as "best ever published in England".

The review in the Athenæum was cold, as always, and insolent.

Describes a letter he has written to the Athenæum in which he mentions CL’s views on species modification ["Doctrine of heterogeny", Collected papers 2: 78–80].

Comments on criticism of Lyell’s book [Antiquity] by Falconer and others.

Mentions his eczema.

Invites the Lyells to visit.

CD’s photograph evokes PGK’s reminiscence of CD in the Beagle.

No summary available.

Expresses hope that CD is ready to pronounce sentence on his book;

he relates his financial position and mentions that he hopes to get a position at the British Museum.

Sends CD a form he has devised of a proper genealogical table of three or four generations of the families of medical cases, so that hereditary transmission may be more accurately and fully recorded.

Has been in France, conveys good wishes from Quatrefages.

Describes the fossil of an unusual mammal head from Brazil.