Dear Sir

I lately received, but I do not know by whom sent, a copy of yr “Darwinsche Theorie,” & I hope that you will allow me to express the admiration & interest which it has excited in me.¹ I must also thank you very sincerely for the manner in which you speak of my works. I am well aware that your generosity leads you to form much too high an estimate of what I have done; but it is deeply gratifying to receive the sympathy of so experienced an observer as yourself. As I am a very poor German scholar, I have as yet read only a portion; but I have already found many observations & incidental remarks of especial interest to me.

The case of the male silver pheasant who was rejected by the females when despoiled of his ornaments will be very useful to me to quote in what I am now writing. I wish you had specified a little more in detail in what manner the plumage was injured.² If you have yourself observed any analogous facts with mammals or birds, & would be so obliging as to communicate them I sh^d feel particularly grateful.

Pray believe me dear Sir, with my best thanks & sincere respect | yours very faithfully | Charles Darwin.

P.S. I will venture to trouble you with one other question, on the chance of your having bred last year the Pavo spiciferus: I am very anxious to know whether the spurs in this Species are developed earlier or later in life, or at about the same period, as in the male of Pavo muticus.³

It w^d be necessary to compare birds of the 2 species hatched last summer; for the spurs are quite small during the first year.

I fear that there is no chance of y^r possessing both sexes of the mandrill baboon,—