From J. B. Thayer   29 January 1878

My dear Sir.

The receipt of your letter acknowledging the arrival of the book about Chauncey Wright—for which I am much obliged,—silently reminds me that I have not yet sent home the letters which you had the great kindness to send me last fall.¹ Some of them, I remember, you did not care to have returned; but I have forgotten which these were and the safest course will be to send all. And I do so herewith. The letters are six in number.

I need not say how valuable an addition they were to my collection.

In the selection of some passages from your letters to Wright, I trust there was nothing displeasing to you. In preparing the proof to send to you, I had intended to allow time to ask your express permission, but it turned out that the delay would be a serious embarrassment here and so, after consultation with Mr. Norton,² I took the liberty of inserting such passages as you saw. In doing this I was studious to omit whatever might, by any chance, seem to you objectionable.³ Yet it was a liberty which I was sorry to take without your leave & probably should not have taken, had not Mr. Norton’s judgment concurred with my own.

Should you care for any more copies of the book, it would give me real pleasure to send them to you.

Yours with great respect | J B Thayer

Charles Darwin Esq.— England