WCP4231

[1]

Parkstone, Dorset

Sept[embe]^r 10th 1893

My dear Cockerell¹

I was very glad to have your letter & to hear that you are so well settled. I did not quite know from the notice in "Nature" whether you had merely gone "on leave". I am not surprised at the climate of Jamaica on the plains not suiting you. If you could have lived at 2000 or 3000 feet elevation it would I expect have been all right but that was I suppose impossible.

I see you are near a big river, the Rio Bravo del Norte², so I suppose there is some fertility on its banks though the climate is so arid. Are the Organ Mountains³ of any height? I had, from Mr Hanbury’s of garden seeds of Escallonia Organensis⁴ said to come from your Organ <mnt^ns?> though the genus is quite S. South American to Magellan. I raised one plant, but it would not flower[?]. It is said [2] to be ^a very beautiful dwarf shrub, dark glossy leaves, red stems & rosy flowers. When you go to the mountains look out for it, & if you [1 word illeg.] find any in seed send me a little, also any bulbs or handsome herbaceous plants likely to grow. No doubt you will have plenty of time to make excursions [1 word illeg.] in the mountains as Professors have usually more holiday time than Curators.

I have seen <B Sharpe’s?> paper. He is not very logical, though he has plenty of knowledge of details. D^r Merriman & other Americans do not seem to me to be able to take [a] broad view of these matters, but allow a few new facts in one direction to overweigh 3 or 4 times as many old facts in the opposite direction.

[3] I suppose you get the American reprints of the reviews or have seen any articles in the "Fortnightly⁵" on the ^non- heredity of acquired variations mainly in answer to Herbert Spencer, who — on this point — seems unduly prejudiced, & no wonder since his whole theory of evolution is founded on the assumed[?] heredity of such characters. I see Weismann has replied to him in this month’s "Contemporary⁶" which I have not seen yet.

I have now taken up and old subject which has always interested me — the Glacial Epoch — and am writing two articles for the Fortnightly in defence of Ramsay’s[?] Theory of the [4] glacial origin of the Alpine Lakes. I & wife went to the Lakes for a month — ^{in July and August} our first visit there. I was delighted both with the scenery and the glacial phenomena. The mountains are very precipitous, with fine bold outlines & grand precipices, & then summits at 3000 f[ee]t quite as grand [1 word illeg. crossed out] examples of mountain structure & of denudations as 12,000 or 14,000 f[oo]t. peaks in the Rockies!

We have had an unprecedented sprinlg & summer here & all over England. From [the] mid[dle]. of March & all through April & May & June, hardly a shower! Three or four heavy thunderstorms in early July with tropical downpours for an hour or two, and since then almost constant fine weather till now!

Give my fine remembrances to Mrs C[ockerell].—who I hope likes New Mexico as well as Jamaica (or better).

Yours very faithfully | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]