WCP3614

[1]

Parkstone, Dorset.

Dec[embe]^r. 22nd. 1900.

Dear Mr. Lydekker¹

Many thanks for your appreciative notice of my "Studies"² in Nature. You are the first of my reviewers who has taken the trouble to read even the first volume.

I was much interested to find that you had also arrived at the conclusion that the Australians are low Caucasians I shall be glad to know where that appeared, and [2] also if you know of any foreign author who came to the same conclusion before 1893. With regard to your remark as to the "bow — & arrow", I may say that I consider customs, however peculiar, as of absolutely no value in opposition to physical characteristics, & only to be used as confirmatory. Physically, the pure brown Polynesians have no [3] resemblance whatever to pure Malays.

Believe me | Yours very truly | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]