WCP4402

[1]

Parkstone, Dorset.

March 26th. 1896

My dear Poulton¹

As to the labels I can only say as before that none are mine but the little round ones. Each purchaser no doubt put on his own labels with date of purchase &c. Some may have been put on by Stevens,² as many butts. were sent in papers & he set them out. Higgins³ was the successor of Stevens & took over his stock, & had all my unsold duplicates. The dates are evidently always the dates [2] of purchase. Westwood,⁴ having but a small amount for purchases, used to buy damaged specimens at a low price & patch them up. He did this very cleverly, but you must have come across some.

Borneo (Low)⁵would not be my collecting at all but Sir Hugh Lows from N. Borneo.

(S) would probably be Salwatty [3] where Allen⁶ collected a little for me.

You will probably have two distinct series of labels ^{of my insects,} those of W. W. Saunders on almost all the moths and miscellaneous orders, — & those of Westwood chiefly on butterflies, & the dates will I expect be always the date of purchase. The date of collecting will be shown by my Mal. Archipelago.

I shall be glad to give you any further information but none of the square tickets [4] would be mine, except perhaps on my private coll. of Butterflies which all went to Hewitson⁷ & thence to the B. Museum.

Lloyd Morgan⁸ has sent me a copy of Romanes⁹ volume. I think "Cope"¹⁰ would be rather lost in the Hope Library as it has no reference to insects, & would be more accessible to biologists generally in the Linnean or Zool. I should therefore much prefer it to go to the Linnean.

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

Prof. E. B. Poulton