WCP2269

Letter (WCP2269.2159)

[1]1

Feby 24 [1871]2

Dear Mr Wallace

I write to thank you for what you have said of me & mine in your address3 to the Ent[omological] Soc[iety]4. It is to me beyond all money value & gave me a thrill of pleasure when I read it[.] It is all the pay we get but as I have said is beyond price[.] It will be sunshine as long as I can draw a butterfly[.] I thank you too [2] for your observations on Kirby[’]s5 work[.]6 It is a great work but marred by his genera[.] Butler7 is doing far more mischief than Kirby he is not only adopting Hubner[']s8 genera but making so many of his own as he says "to facilitate the study" that his pamphlets are for me written in an unknown tongue[.] I see that your address is at your new place9 & therefore suppose that you are in your new house[.] I should greatly like to see what you have [3] done in landscape gardening but I am now so sensitive to damp that I fear I shall before long have to shut myself up in the house[.]

I hope that your wife10 & children11 are well & should like to be kindly remembered to Mrs Wallace[.]

Yours very truly | W. C. Hewitson [signature]

[4]12

1
An annotation in blue crayon reads "1871".
2
The year "1871" is established by the date of the Entomological Society of London President's Address. See endnote 3 below.
3
ARW gave the President's Address 23 January 1871 and mentions Hewitson on page xlix. See Wallace, A. R. 1871. The President's Address. Transactions of the Entomological Society Of London [for the year 1870]. pp. xliv-lxix.
4
Entomological Society of London.
5
Kirby, William Forsell (1844-1912). British entomologist and folklorist.
6
Kirby, W. F. 1870. On the necessity of a reform in the generic nomenclature of diurnal Lepidoptera. The Journal of the Linnean Society. pp. 494-503.
7
Butler, Arthur Gardiner (1844-1925). British entomologist, arachnologist and ornithologist at the British Museum.
8
Hübner, Jacob (1761-1826). German entomologist.
9
Holly House, Tanner Street, Barking.
10
Wallace (née Mitten), Annie (1846-1914). British. Wife of ARW; daughter of William Mitten.
11
At the time of this letter ARW had 2 children: Wallace, Herbert Spencer ("Bertie") (1867-1874) and Wallace, Violet Isabel (1869-1945).
12
A pencil annotation in the middle of the page on an otherwise blank page reads "Hewitson".

Editorial information

Status: Edited (but not proofed) transcription [Letter (WCP2269.2159)]

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

Revision history

Transcribed by Newman-Plotnick, Harry [2018-08-15] Transcription checked by Costa, Leslie [2022-07-19]

Please cite as “WCP2269,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 29 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP2269