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 letter contains a reference to the prolonged
period of ill-health which Darwin suffered in 1863 and 1864, and in this
connection the present letter is of interest.

The Copley Medal was given to him in 1864.)

I had not heard a word about the Copley Medal. Please give Falconer
my cordial thanks for his interest about me. I enclose the list of
everything published by me except a few unimportant papers. Ask Falconer
not to mention that I sent the list, as some one might say I had been
canvassing, which is an odious imputation. The origin of the Voyage in
the "Beagle" was that Fitz-Roy generously offered to give up half his
cabin to any one who would volunteer to go as naturalist. Beaufort wrote
to Cambridge, and I volunteered. Fitz-Roy never persuaded me to give
up the voyage on account of sickness, nor did I ever think of doing so,
though I suffered considerably; but I do not believe it was the cause of
my subsequent ill-health, which has lost me so many years, and therefore
I should not think the sea-sickness was worth notice. It would save you
trouble to forward this with my kindest remembrances to Falconer.

(176/1. The following letter was the beginning of a correspondence with
Mr. B.D. Walsh, whom C.V. Riley describes as "one of the ablest and most
thorough entomologists of our time.")

LETTER 176. B.D. WALSH TO CHARLES DARWIN. Rock Island, Illinois, U.S.,
April 29th, 1864.

(176/2. The words in square brackets are restorations of parts torn off
the original letter.)

More than thirty years ago I was introduced to you at your rooms in
Christ's College by A.W. Grisebach, and had the pleasure of seeing your
noble collection of British Coleoptera. Some years afterwards I became a
Fellow of Trinity, and finally gave up my Fellowship rather than go into
Orders, and came to this country. For the last five or six years I have
been paying considerable attention to the insect fauna of the U.S., some
of the fruits of which you will see in the enclosed pamphlets. Allow
me to take this opportunity of thanking you for the publication of your
"Origin of Species," which I read three years ago by the advice of
a botanical friend, though I had a strong prejudice against what I
supposed then to be your views. The first perusal staggered me, the
second convinced me, and the oftener I read it the more convinced I am
of the general soundness of your theory.

As you have called upon naturalists that believe in your views to give
public testimony of their convictions, I have directed your attention on
the outside of one or two of my pamphlets to the particular passages in
which [I] have done so. You will please accept these papers from me in
token of my respect and admiration.

As you may see from the latest of these papers, I [have] recently made
the remarkable discover that there [are the] so-called "three sexes" not
only in social insects but [also in the] strictly solitary genus Cynips.

When is your great work to make its appearance? [I should be] much
pleased to receive a few lines from you.

LETTER 177. TO B.D. WALSH. Down, October 21st [1864].

Ill-health has prevented me from sooner thanking you for your very kind
letter and several memoirs.

I have been very much pleased to see how boldly and clearly you speak
out on the modification of species. I thank you for giving me the pages
of reference; but they were superfluous, for I found so many original
and profound remarks that I have carefully looked through all the
papers. I hope that your discovery about the Cynips (177/1. "On
Dimorphism in the hymenopterous genus Cynips," "Proc. Entom. Soc.
Philadelphia," March, 1864. Mr. Walsh's view is that Cynips quercus
aciculata is a dimorphous form of Cynips q. spongifica, and occurs only
as a female. Cynips q. spongifica also produces spongifica females and
males from other galls at a different time of year.) will hold good, for
it is a remarkable one, and I for one have often marvelled what could
be the meaning of the case. I will lend your paper to my neighbour Mr.
Lubbock, who I know is much interested in the subject. Incidentally I
shall profit by your remarks on galls. If you have time I think a rather
hopeless experiment would be worth trying; anyhow, I should have tried
it had my health permitted. It is to insert a minute grain of some
organic substance, together with the poison from bees, sand-wasps,
ichneumons, adders, and even alkaloid poisons into the tissues of
fitting plants for the chance of monstrous growths being produced.
(177/2. See "Life and Letters," III., page 346, for an account of
experiments attempted in this direction by Mr. Darwin in 1880. On the
effects of injuring plant-tissues, see Massart, "La Cicatrisation, etc."
in Tome LVII. of the "Memoires Couronnes" of the Brussels Academy.)

My health has long been poor, and I have lately suffered from a long
illness which has interrupted all work, but I am now recommencing a
volume in connection with the "Origin."

P.S.--If you write again I should very much like to hear what your life
in your new country is.

What can be the meaning or use of the great diversity of the external
generative organs in your cases, in Bombus, and the phytophagous
coleoptera?

What can there be in the act of copulation necessitating such complex
and diversified apparatus?

LETTER 178. TO W.H. FLOWER. Down, July 11th, 1864.

I am truly obliged for all the trouble which you have taken for me, and
for your very interesting note. I had only vaguely heard it said that
frogs had a rudiment of a sixth toe; had I known that such great men
had looked to the point I should not have dreamed of looking myself. The
rudiment sent to you was from a full-grown frog; so that if these bones
are the two cuneiforms they must, I should think, be considered to be
in a rudimentary condition. This afternoon my gardener brought in
some tadpoles with the hind-legs alone developed, and I looked at the
rudiment. At this age it certainly looks extremely like a digit, for
the extremity is enlarged like that of the adjoining real toe, and
the transverse articulation seems similar. I am sorry that the case is
doubtful, for if these batrachians had six toes, I certainly think
it would have thrown light on the truly extraordinary strength of
inheritance in polydactylism in so many animals, and especially on the
power of regeneration in amputated supernumerary digits. (178/1. In the
first edition of "Variation under Domestication" the view here given is
upheld, but in the second edition (Volume I., page 459) Darwin withdrew
his belief that the development of supernumerary digits in man is "a
case of reversion to a lowly-organised progenitor provided with more
than five digits." See Letters 161, 270.)

LETTER 179. TO J.D. HOOKER. Down [October 22nd, 1864].

The Lyells have been here, and were extremely pleasant, but I saw them
only occasionally for ten minutes, and when they went I had an awful day
[of illness]; but I am now slowly getting up to my former standard. I
sha
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