Ɛpsilon

WCP7142

Transcription (WCP7142.8272)

[1]1

Down Beckenham (black)

Nov. 9th. 1880

My dear Miss Buckley

Your last letter and the M.S. notes are all as clear and full as could possibly be desired. I quite agree with your summary of Wallace’s more important results;2 but I have added a sentence about the colouring of animals.3 I fear that it would never do to ask a Cabinet Minister (the Duke of Argyll) to sign a memorial to the Prime Minister.4 This morning I drew up a long and full statement of Wallace’s claims, position &c., and have sent it to be well copied.5 Immediately on its return it shall be despatched to Huxley.6 I hardly ever wished for anything more than I do for the success of our efforts.

Yours very sincerely | Ch. Darwin

1
The following is written above the address. It would not have been part of the original letter: “8. C. Darwin to Miss Buckley”
2
Buckley had sent a summary of Alfred Russel Wallace’s claims for a government pension (see letter from A. B. Buckley, 7 November 1880 and enclosure).
3
For Wallace’s theory of protective coloration, see Wallace 1878, pp. 158-220; he had corresponded at length with CD on the topic (see, for example, Correspondence vol. 19, letter to A. R. Wallace, 30 January [1871]).
4
George Douglas Campbell was appointed lord privy seal in April 1880 (ODNB); the prime minister was William Ewart Gladstone.
5
There is a draft of the memorial in DAR 196: 3; for a transcription, see Appendix VI.
6
Thomas Henry Huxley.

Editorial information

Status: Draft transcription [Transcription (WCP7142.8272)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by Darwin Correspondence Project [2020-06-11]

Please cite as “WCP7142,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP7142