From H. N. Moseley   7 October 1881

My dear M^r Darwin

A thousand thanks for your new book.¹ It is very kind of you to have sent me a copy. I have only been able to get twenty minutes at it as yet but am delighted. The big Ceylon worm is an old friend of mine. I got it hunted for me by a coolie trained by D^r. Thwaites.² He only got me two after a whole days labour for the ground was dry at the time. He brought back one egg with each specimen and told me the worm always keeps its single egg at the bottom of its burrow and guards it till hatched. The egg is as far as I remember as large as this flask shaped   the capsule being transparent and chitinous. and the young worm in the only broken one of the two was fully formed coiled inside. Both the old one and egg are at Oxford in the museum   I mean to have described them long ago but did not somehow.³

A similar huge worm is common in New South Wales. And I got a specimen through one of the residents, which is amongst the Challenger collection.⁴ He sent for it from some swampy land of his up country and told me it made mounds as big as mole hills. Its head is as large as this but it was broken and I could not tell how long but at least a yard I think. I rather think it is described as Megascolex. It is Peritrichous.⁵ I dare say you know all about both.

Again thanking you for the pleasure you have given me. | yours truly H N Moseley.