My dear Darwin,—­I need not say how very grateful I am to you for your constant kindness, and especially for the trouble you have taken in recommending me to Mr. Gladstone.  It is also, of course, very gratifying to hear that so many eminent men have so good an opinion of the little scientific work I have done, for I myself feel it to be very little in comparison with that of many others.

The amount you say Mr. Gladstone proposes to recommend is considerably more than I expected would be given, and it will relieve me from a great deal of the anxieties under which I have laboured for several years.  To-day is my fifty-eighth birthday, and it is a happy omen that your letter should have arrived this morning.

I presume after I receive the official communication will be the proper time to thank the persons who have signed the memorial in my favour.  I do not know whether it is the proper etiquette to write a private letter of thanks to Mr. Gladstone, or only a general official one.  Whenever I hear anything from the Government I will let you know.

Again thanking you for your kindness, believe me yours very faithfully,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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Down, Beckenham, Kent.  January 10, 1881.

My dear Wallace,—­I am heartily glad that you are pleased about the memorial.

I do not feel that my opinion is worth much on the point which you mention.  A relation who is in a Government office and whose judgment, I think, may be fully trusted, felt sure that if you received an official announcement without any private note, it ought to be answered officially, but if the case were mine, I would express whatever I thought and felt in an official document.  His reason was that Gladstone gives or recommends the pension on public grounds alone.

If the case were mine I would not write to signers of the memorial, because I believe that they acted like so many jurymen in a claim against the Government.  Nevertheless, if I met any of them or was writing to them on any other subject, I should take the opportunity of expressing my feelings.  I think you might with propriety write to Huxley, as he entered so heartily into the scheme and aided in the most important manner in many ways.

Sir J. Lubbock called here yesterday and Mr. F. Balfour came here with one of my sons, and it would have pleased you to see how unfeignedly delighted they were at my news of the success of the memorial.

I wrote also to tell the Duke of Argyll of the success, and he in answer expressed very sincere pleasure.—­My dear Wallace, yours very sincerely,

CH.  DARWIN.

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Pen-y-bryn, St. Peter’s Road, Croydon.  January 29, 1881.