WCP697

[1]¹

Dec^r <1899>²

My dear Fred Birch,³

Many thanks <for> your little book of your tour in W<ales>. It must have been most delightful & from your journal you do not seem to have minded the solitariness and yet I should think a congenial companion in equally good health & strength would have rendered the tour still more enjoyable. I know a good deal of the country you went over about Snowdon & Cader Idris, but not the first part N<orth> of Snowdon. The Railway up Snowdon must be an abomination! I am s<ure> you had not a fine day at Cader Idris <MS burned> it is a very fine mountain & so different from Snowdon. The enormous accumulation of huge blocks all along the ridge of the summit for a mile is very remarkable. There seems no where for them to have come from. The⁴precipice walk is very fine, and the torrent walk very pretty. [2] <MS burned> told by friends that the<MS burned> s, up the long ridge from Capel <Curig>, or up by Y Tryfan from Llyn Ogwen, <is> very fine, and are far less overrun <by> tourists. Llyn Idwall is well worth <v>isiting, and the strange cleft of the Twll Du called in English "The Devil’s Kitchen", is curious, and all the ledges of the cliffs on each side of it are rich in plants.

I see you know nothing yet of the glacial period, & its results, which are to be beautifully seen in and around Snowdon, and when once seen will be a perpetual interest to you in all visits to mountains whether in Wales, the Lakes, or Scotland. I therefore send you (on loan) a little book by the late Prof. Ramsay.⁵ I took this with me the first time I went to Snowdon in 1866; and was delighted with the grooved rocks all up the valley from Llanberris, & the moraines in Cwm Glas looking just like artificial earthworks. You can have this little book & map with you the next [3] time you go to the <MS burned> & return it when you come <MS burned>

I send you 2 more copies of <Bad> Times to give away to any of your friends who will like to have it.

I also send you as a New Years gift a copy of my "Wonderful Century"⁶ which I think will interest you.

Your curious pale-coloured sea-side beetle I think is a Nebria I used to find at Swansea. I forget the specific name.

Your photo. does not quite do you justice as you are, as you say, looking a little anxious.

I shall send this parcel off on Friday so that it may reach you on Saturday or New Year’s Day.

With best wishes, | Believe me | yours very truly | Alfred R Wallace [signature]