From C. C. Babington 28 October 1833

Dear Henslow

As it will not now be in my power to return to Cambridge till after Xmas, I send you a few lines to tell what I have done. I will first mention the reason of my staying here this term; My mother who has long been in an ill state of health, tumbled down a few days since & fractured the neck of her thigh bone & is now so unwell with it that I cannot think of leaving her.

I have got a few plants for your Dups & the following in about 55^s Mercurialis annua [symbols for male and female], Corydalis lutea (as wild as I think it is ever found) from an old wall, Galium tricorne & Cystopteris fragilis; also some minute ferns. I have been so much employed during last summer that I have not had time to prepare more 50^s. I have gone through Don & Hooker & entered all the synon. in your Catalogue & as the 3^rd vol of Don will probably appear this winter I hope to be able to add it as I suppose you do not care for having the 2^nd ed. printed sooner than the beginning of your lectures.

We have found a new Brit Euphorbia (epithymiodes Lin.) near here truly wild, I have a spec. for you. I have obtained a copy of the Cambridge signatures & am very much pleased with the book, the reports appear well drawn up. I will keep the two remaining tickets for you.

You ask me to keep for you dups of insects & shells of the latter I have none, the insects are all at Cambridge.

I hope to be at Cambridge in Jan^y when I trust that I shall be able to convince you that I have not quite (Botan. speaking) wasted my time this summer. I find near here Symphytum asperrimum of Beiberstein to all appearance wild but being an Asiatic it has no doubt been naturalised, it grows in plenty in a boggy place about 5 miles off, I have dried a lot of spec. thinking that you might like them. Be so kind Mr Proproctor as to remember me to all friends & believe me ever yours truly

Charles C. Babington