My dear Sir

I have received your various communications.¹ I very much dislike my letters being published as advertisements, but I would perhaps submit to this, though extremely disagreeable to me, if I could believe that it would do any good. I hope that you will permit me to speak frankly. It seems to me quite useless to advertise any intended plans, until crowned with success. I am convinced that any one reading your advertisement would consider you a fanatic; and supposing that you succeeded in obtaining a good variety of the plant, which resisted the disease, it would be incomparably more difficult to persuade the public of your success if people thought you a fanatic and consequently would not trust your statements. Whatever weight my name may have you could use to persuade persons privately, to raise seedlings, and this would be amply sufficient. Under these circumstances I return you the MS. and draft; for I am unwilling to aid in what I believe will be a step injurious to your success.²

With respect to the specimens and seeds which you inform me you have dispatched. I am sorry to say that I am so much out of health and overworked that I cannot undertake the crossing experiments and all the care and difficulty of raising new varieties. I wish I had known of the plan some years ago. Shall I return the specimens to you?³

There is not the least difficulty in crossing varieties; it is not necessary to remove the anthers of the seed-bearing plant, as the pollen from another variety, if not put on the stigma very late, and especially if applied more than once, has a prepotent influence over the plant’s own pollen.⁴

In haste | I remain, dear Sir | Yours faithfully | Charles Darwin

James Torbitt, Esq^re | Belfast