From H. E. Litchfield to Emma Darwin   5 April [1866]

Dearest Mama

First for ophrys. I am struck all of a heap by hearing you have told Muggeridge about Lutea. surely, surely, I only said “as far as I cd make out it was lutea & that I’d ask Battersby.” at last I have seen young Balt who is the practical botanist & he says it is fusca. So I have made you perpetuate my shame, but I shall copy out the descriptions of the two to show you it is hard to tell between them. (O. fusca, Labelle atténué en coin à la base, brun velouté presque sur les bords, à tache jaune glabie à la base; tige 1, 2 dec) (O. lutea Labelle brusquement rétréci à la base glabre et jaune sur les bords, àtache jaune or pourprée à la base, tige 1,2 dec.) & both flower in May & grow in the Midi. They are so short & Wood’s is not much longer, & generally contradicts Gillet in the points I make my flower agree with description, but I always do compare the two, & in fusca it says “velvet to the edge” & there is a distinct yellow edge in my ophrys but of course Battersby must know. The other ophrys I have found is aranifera. I made it out aranifera & he confirmed me. He said some that Aranifera [illeg] into scolopax (& apifera I think) all the season & that some of my specimens were blending into scolopax, but since all my mistakes I thought I was altogether in a muddle & didn’t look any more at pollen masses. I will go to the lutea place. I have just been looking at Wood again & I cannot help thinking it is lutea. It won’t agree with fusca & it will (moderately) with lutea, it grew in rocky places not open pastures, its petals are not hairy they are more than $\frac{1}{2}$ sepals, but I suppose Balt easly knows. I shd like to go on a warm day so I won’t today but perhaps may tomorrow. I daresay I’m all wrong after all but I felt at the time sure they were self fertilised, but don’t depend on my facts till I’ve been again. lutea is not put near scolopax in Gillet et Magne & according to Battersby they are utterly different in appearance. I will go tomorrow if not today. I believe there is an old & a young Mogg, but now we certainly are not going to Menton for some time so continue to write here & please send 1 line to Em. T. telling her to write to Cannes, praps Lizzie wd do it as I can’t for the life of me remember what I said. I’m very glad we are to have the Hensleighs after all. My tour is gone to g^t. smash. Miss Smith is quite unfit to travel. We may go on to Menton & San Remo but Genoa I think is gone to the dogs. It will be very nice to go some expeds & walks with the Hensleighs. I’m going to try & hook on to Miss Robertson who has at any rate the virtue of being pretty or rather pretty & now her beloved is gone I have dared to propose a walk. It is a great comfort have the Sprightly Pock & the idiotic Pillons gone, they went off yesterday & we had a much more rational dinner in consequence. Elinor is getting better I hope but I don’t see the wonderful effects of abroad & I think they have been too sanguine to hope it wd. I wish she wd see a real D^r. in London, the pain is in one place lately & it is tender externally which sounds to me so much more like inflammation of a vertebra than neuralgia, but don’t repeat what I tell you, please, to anybody, but I can’t help feeling uneasy about it. She I hope is satisfied that it is neuralgia herself. I think they wd have been horribly dismal without me. Miss Smith depends so much on doing things & Elinor sinks into the depths of dismality if not roused up, so that even if my tour, wh. it won’t, was to turn out a complete fiasco as far as I am concerned I shd be equally glad I had come. Miss S.s eyes are better & her throat & if it wd get really warm we shd do very well. We haven’t seen any thing more of Miss V. & if she was charitable I thk she wd have offered to go another walk with me, knowing I have been a week with both of them laid up, but it is wonderful how different things look on the other side of the question. Elinor & I are going to an [illeg] to [illeg] I don’t have a word to say, particularly as I’ve got nothing [illeg] H.E.D