9 St. Mark’s Crescent, N.W.  October 20, 1869.

Dear Darwin,—­I do not know your son’s (Mr. George Darwin’s) address at Cambridge.  Will you be so good as to forward him the enclosed note begging for a little information?

I was delighted to see the notice in the Academy that you are really going to bring out your book on Man.  I anticipate for it an enormous sale, and shall read it with intense interest, although I expect to find in it more to differ from than in any of your other books.  Some reasonable and reasoning opponents are now taking the field.  I have been writing a little notice of Murphy’s “Habit and Intelligence,” which, with much that is strange and unintelligible, contains some very acute criticisms and the statement of a few real difficulties.  Another article just sent me from the Month contains some good criticism.  How incipient organs can be useful is a real difficulty, so is the independent origin of similar complex organs; but most of his other points, though well put, are not very formidable.  I am trying to begin a little book on the Distribution of Animals, but I fear I shall not make much of it from my idleness in collecting facts.

I shall make it a popular sketch first, and, if it succeeds, gather materials for enlarging it at a future time.  If any suggestion occurs to you as to the kind of maps that would be best, or on any other essential point, I should be glad of a hint.  I hope your residence in Wales did you good.  I had no idea you were so near Dolgelly till I met your son there one evening when I was going to leave the next morning.  It is a glorious country, but the time I like is May and June—­the foliage is so glorious.

Sincerely hoping you are pretty well, and with kind regards to Mrs. Darwin and the rest of your family, believe me yours very faithfully,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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Down, Beckenham, Kent, S.E.  October 21, 1869.

My dear Wallace,—­I forwarded your letter at once to my son George, but I am nearly sure that he will not be able to tell you anything; I wish he could for my own sake; but I suspect there are few men in England who could.  Pray send me a copy or tell me where your article on Murphy will be published.  I have just received the Month, but have only read half as yet.  I wish I knew who was the author; you ought to know, as he admires you so much; he has a wonderful deal of knowledge, but his difficulties have not troubled me much as yet, except the case of the dipterous larva.  My book will not be published for a long time, but Murray wished to insert some notice of it.  Sexual selection has been a tremendous job.  Fate has ordained that almost every point on which we differ should be crowded into this vol.  Have you seen the October number of the Revue des deux Mondes? It has an article on you, but I have not yet read it; and another article, not yet read, by a very good man on the Transformist School.