WCP4865

Holly House, Barking. E.

Dec^r 28th. 1870

Dear Sir Charles

I beg to thank you for the copy of your "Students’ Elements of Geology"¹ which I received a few days ago. I am greatly pleased with its appearance and getting[?] up. The arrangement also is so clear, and the woodcuts, paper, and printing so beautiful, that I feel sure it will be exceedingly popular and have an immense sale.

I think your preface will give people the idea that it is more abridged than it really is, since from what I can see, it , contains almost everything [2] in the larger work that is essential to Students, together with new & valuable matter.

A short time ago I received a letter from Mr. A[lfred]. Everett² who is at Sarawak. He tells me he hopes to do more at the Caves³ next year but that he has had great difficulties to contend with owing to his want of funds. For this reason his brother⁴ has been obliged to take a mercantile situation, and he is obliged to devote most of his time to collecting such specimens of Natural History as will pay him best. To explore the caves [3] requires a large expenditure of time as well as expense for labour; and as a person who has had some instruction in cave-digging is out there, it seems to me a great pity that he should not be enabled to do something. He seems to think that there is good work to be done in there, & perhaps you can suggest some means of raising some money to enable him to work out thoroughly some portion of one or two caves.

I remain D[ea]^r Sir Charles | Yours very faithfully | Alfred R. Wallace [signature]

Sir Charles Lyell Bar[one]t.