To Thomas Martin 2 August 1854

My dear Sir,

I must thank you for the 2 papers – the accounts in which have much interested me – but positions [opportunities] are very different in regard to those we try to aid – but these mutual [hints] suggest thoughts which each may turn to his advantage in the common cause – I dare say there are many who will say my alluding to Dicotyledons is overdoing the thing – but in drawing up Programmes I have respect for all classes as well the uninstructed among the educated, as the non-educated. – True for one, true for another – The terms in which great generalizations are conveyed ought to become household words – I have separately asked 3 of the 4 little Botanists of my School, whom I took to Cambridge, what they liked best – & each replied – they could not tell, as every thing was so interesting – on asking what would you wish to see again, if I said I could take you see only one of the objects you saw – they each immediately said the “Botanic Garden”, & in a way that convinced me this was their preference – acquainted as they are with the grouping of our wild flowers they readily understood the merits of our classifying all plants into natural groups, & could appreciate what they saw in the Garden more than they could of the architecture of the buildings however striking – I have been interested in hearing what different parties preferred – the Pork-butcher exceedingly admired the buildings, but his chief preference was the anatomical museum, & the wax models of subjects under dissection! Several mistook these for real subjects, & one asked if one was wax, or a newly killed [letter cut]

[illeg.]

J. S. Henslow