WCP2077

Letter (WCP2077.1967)

[1]1,2

Shoaygyeen —3

Oct 26. 1866 —

A. R. Wallace Esq

D[ea]r Sir.

You letter of the 7th.[?] September4 reached me by the last mail — and I hasten to reply to it.

On or about the 15 I[?] est[imate][?]. I move out into the interior of the district and shall remain out incessantly moving until the middle of next May if nothing unforeseen occurs. During the whole of the time I shall be in a thickly wooded and mountainous count[r]y in w[hic]h. the temperature varies so much that in the northern frontier we have pine forests and violets[,] the latter without smell however.

I fancy my best plan will be to go on steadily collecting and on my return here in May to send home the results of any [2] work —

I have also heard from a Dr Wallace from Colchester5 — who however is only intent on acclimatizing silk producing moths and whose views I shall be happy to forward as much as I can.

I have to thank you for your hints as to the best means of collecting, and I shall be most happy to accept your kind offer anent6 disposing of the insects. If I can collect and for[war]d[?] some butterflies, moths & beetles without putting myself to any great expense I shall be quite content.

During the rains i.e[.] from May till Nov. I am always in Shoaygyeen and am then so tied down to Court and office work that I can but rarely get away even for a day. During the cold & hot seasons however my duties take me incessantly about and I am thus enabled to beat the whole country up as it were — and as my movements depend entirely on myself and I can halt or move on as I choose I trust that I may [3] be able to gradually get a very complete collection.

A great difficulty is in the absence of all Books. I know of none w[hic]h. is trustworthy and w[hic]h. gives any information anent Animals at all and more especially anent the Yonzaleen7 that portion of it in w[hic]h. my work lies just now.

I enclose my address — of any change in w[hic]h. I will keep you duly informed.

I fancy that Phytophaga8 and small Coleoptera are best send home in quill pens?9

Yours very truly | Horace Spearman [signature]

1
Page 1 is numbered 20 by the repository. Every second subsequent page has a consecutive handwritten number written in the upper right-hand corner of the page.
2
Annotated in ink in upper left corner, in ARW's? hand: "Wrote to him April 15th 1867". The letter is presumed lost: see record description for WCP5211.5731.
3
Shoaygyeen, (more commonly Shwé-gyeen) was a town in the Sittoung River valley in British Burma (also Burmah), now Myanmar. Current name and exact location not found. 1869. Physical Geography. Item 6. The main rivers. British Burma Foreign Department (General). Administration Report for 1868-69. Rangoon: Chief Commissioner's Office Press. [pp. 4, 5] No author, but forwarded by Horace Spearman, Assistant Secretary to the Chief Commissioner, British Burma.
4
The letter has not been found and is presumed lost. See record description for WCP5210.5730.
5
Wallace, Alexander (1829-1899) Physician, entomologist, and plantsman.
6
anent: about, relating to. Middle English, revived C19. OED.
7
The Yonzaleen (now the Yunzalin /Yunsaline) River in British Burma (now Myanmar). Route No. 27. 219-221. [p. 219]. In MacNeill, Douglas. 1883. Report and Gazetteer of Burma, Native and British. Part 1. Simla: Govt. Central Branch Press.
8
Phytophaga. Any of several groups of vegetable-feeding animals: here probably referring to a large division of Coleoptera (Beetles). Merriam-Webster Dictionary.
9
i.e. in protective hollow tubes made from quill (feather) pens.

Editorial information

Status: Edited (but not proofed) transcription [Letter (WCP2077.1967)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by Lucas, Paula [2019-12-20] Transcription checked by Lucas, Paula [2019-12-20]

Please cite as “WCP2077,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 19 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP2077