WCP4232

[1]

Parkstone, Dorset

Oct[obe]^r 6th 1893

My dear Cockerell¹

I was exceedingly grieved to hear of your sad loss. I was in hopes [sic?] you might both have had many years of happiness in your new house which seemed in many respects so suitable. I need not say you have my sincerest sympathy. In such cases words are useless, & time & work are the only consolers.

I have just lost my last [2] colateral relative in England, my sister², who though at the ripe age of 81 had such a good constitution that except for the special disease, — a tumour on the throat, which burst inwardly & produced many complications — she might have lived many years. Strange to say it was the first death bed I had ever witnessed, & fortunately it was not[?] a [3] painful one. But it brought home to me the great mystery of death — & life — in a manner nothing else could do. Even without the many facts & I have witnessed — & others I believe in, showing that "death is a delusion" & is only a gateway to continued life — even without this, it seems impossible really to believe that this world of seething struggling life — culminating in man with all his grand powers & high aspirations — can [4] all really pass away & the future be as if all this had not been. Yet if man does not continue to live this will be so, when the world itself ends, as it must some time. In but a few years I must go myself to "solve the great mystery." At present however, saving a few indications of the usual maladies & weaknesses of old age, — I feel in my real self, just as much alive as ever I did in the days of my youth. In fact I think more so. This I think is a helpful sign for the continuity of life. With sincere good wishes for happiness still in store for you.

Believe me, | Yours very sincerely | Alfred R. Wallace³ [signature]