My dear Sir

I hope that you may find time to go on with your experiments on such plants, as Lagerstrœmia, mentioned in your letter of Oct. 29^th.; for I believe you will arrive at new & curious results, more especially if you can raise two sets of seedlings from the two kinds of pollen.¹

Many thanks for the facts about the effects of rain & mud in relation to the waxy secretion.² I have observed many instances of the lower side being protected better than the upper side, in the case, as I believe, of bushes & trees; so that the advantage in low-growing plants is probably only an incidental one. As I am writing away from my home, I have been unwilling to try more than one leaf of the Passiflora & this came out of the water quite dry on the lower surface & quite wet on the upper.—³ I have not yet begun to put my notes together on this subject, & do not at all know whether I shall be able to make much of it. The oddest little fact which I have observed is that with Trifolium resupinatum one half of the leaf (I think the right-hand side when the leaf is viewed from the apex) is protected by waxy secretion & not the other half; so that when the leaf is dipped into water, exactly $\frac{1}{2}$ the leaf comes out dry & $\frac{1}{2}$ wet.

What the meaning of this can be, I cannot even conjecture.⁴

I read last night your very interesting article in Kosmos on the leaves of Crotalaria & so was very glad to see the dried leaves sent by you: it seems to me a very curious case.⁵ I rather doubt whether it will apply to Lupinus, for unless my memory deceives me all the leaves of the same plant sometimes behaved in the same manner.⁶

But I will try & get some of the same seeds of the Lupinus & sow them in the Spring. Old age, however, is telling on me, & it troubles me to have more than one subject at a time on hand.— Kosmos seems to me a very interesting Journal, & I see there is an article on sexual selection which I must read, as it seems to upset all my conclusions.—⁷

With all good wishes for you & all your family | believe me, My dear Sir | Yours ever very sincerely | Charles Darwin