My dear Romanes

I send the M.S. but as far as I can judge by just skimming it, it will be of no use to you.— It seems to bear on transitional forms.² I feel sure that I have other & better cases, but I cannot remember where to look to.—

I sh^d. have written to you in a few days on the following case. The Baron de Villa Franca wrote to me from Brazil about 2 years ago, describing new vars. of sugar-cane which he had raised by planting 2 old varieties in apposition.— I believe (but my memory is very faulty) that I wrote that I c^d not believe in such a result & attributed the new varieties to the soil &c.—³ I believe that I did not understand what he meant by apposition. Yesterday a packet of M.S. arrived from the Brazilian Legation, with a letter in French from D^r Glass, Director of the Botanic Garden,⁴ describing fully how he first attempted grafting vars. of Sugar Cane in various ways & always failed, & then split stems of 2 varieties bound them together & planted them, & thus raised some new & very valuable varieties, which like crossed plants seem to grow with extra vigour, are constant & apparently partake of the characters of the 2 varieties. The Baron, also, sends me an attested copy from a number of Brazilian cultivators of the success of this plan of raising new varieties.— I am not sure whether the B. Legation wishes me to return the Documents, but if I do not hear in 3 or 4 days that they must be returned, they shall be sent to you, for they seem to me well deserving your consideration.⁵ Perhaps if I had been contented with my hyacinth bulbs being merely bound together without any true adhesion or rather growth together, I sh^d. have succeeded like the old Dutch-man.—⁶

There is a deal of superfluous verbiage in the documents, but I have marked with pencil where the important part begins.— The attestations are in duplicate. Now after reading them will you give me your opinion whether the main parts are worthy of publication in Nature: I am inclined to think so, & it is good to encourage science in out of the way parts of the world. Keep this note till you receive the documents, or hear from me.— I wonder whether 2 vars. of wheat c^d. be similarly treated? no, I suppose not from the want of lateral buds.—

I was extremely interested by your abstract on suicide.—⁷

Yours very sincerely | Ch. Darwin

I got the other day the Dec. No^r of the 19^th Century with your Article,⁸ but one thing has come so quickly on the back of another that I have not yet got time to read it quietly.—

P.S. I have just had a note from Grant Allen, calling my attention to capital fact about Sexual Selection in Voyage of the Vega Vol. 2 p. 97.⁹