Dear Darwin

Thanks for Nortons address²   I wanted it to introduce a friend who I think Nortons would like to know.

I am distressed to hear of your continued badness.³

I shall be delighted to go to Down by usual train on Saturday week— Earlier if you like.⁴

Mimosa albida I will see to on my return— meanwhile I hope for seeds of more sensitive kind.⁵

Tyndalls answer has surprized & disappointed me greatly & much vexed all his friends here   He quotes at the end a passage in a letter from me in which deplored such correspondence & blamed “Nature” for inserting them! my letter was addressed to him under the idea that he was on the continent & was intended to sooth any irritation that might lead to a counter-explosion—& miserably I have failed.⁶ It required great tact in announcing his Election as Pres. Elect yesterday— & prevented my seconding it as was prepared to do, with a special allusion to Tyndall’s appreciation of his predecessors labor— Of course this became impossible—& the proposal by Henry Smith & seconding (by Spottiswode) were pronounced by all to be unusually [tame] & heartless— yet both I am sure did their very best. H. Smith dilated on his popularity—⁷ There was a counter propostion by the Mayor of Cork, for D^r Andrews to be President, on purely local grounds—⁸ but it fell to the ground, unsupported by any one but a Belfast Man, who like the Mayor was wholly unscientific— The Cork Scientifics repudiated the attempt with some indignation— but I am not sure but that Tyndall will throw up the Presidency—⁹ Spottiswode & I concocted a letter to him at once, telling him the facts.

This is a very poor meeting indeed. Williamsons address was very poor & badly put together I think.¹⁰ Dr. Williamsons lecture on Coal fossils was popular, well done & very suitable to non scientifics— but void of any philsophical treatment & wrong in points of Botanical detail¹¹

Clark Maxwells lecture on Molecules last night was simply dull dry & singularly unintellagable as delivered— without a point or significance to the outside world.¹²

Ferriers brain work was intensely interesting but I think that he proves far too much.¹³

Burdon Sandersons paper was capital— it is a grand discovery¹⁴ Allman’s address was splendidly done¹⁵

We are very jolly here— in a quiet lodging, (Strachey, Dyer, Lawson)   We go tomorrow to Sir J. K. Shuttleworth near Kirby Lonsdale till Saturday—then back to Kew—¹⁶ I have just heard that Huxley is back “quite well”¹⁷ & that Sharpy¹⁸ has had an apoplectic attack but is better— Strachey says that Georges paper comes off today.¹⁹

Ever yours affec | J D Hooker