My dear Hooker

Many thanks for your note with D^r. Lindleys¹ invitation. I had so strong a wish to accept it, in order to get to know him, that I accepted it, but the next morning I felt so unwell, together with a note from home made me give it up with great reluctance & I wrote a second note to Lindley. I almost wish I had thrown all the circumstances to the dogs & staid; but it is now too late.

My morning with H. C. W.² passed off very prosperously & I had much very interesting talk; but he is rather too sarcastic to my taste. He strikes me as a very clever man. Will you sometime look in your Library & see whether you have the Memoires of the Academy of Nancy 1848–1849. for Godron³ It is not in Linnean or Royal Soc^y.—

I forget exactly when you start, but I shall hear nothing of you now for a long time.⁴ Adios.—

Watson told me some capital stories of the caution requisite about inferring that seeds have lain long buried from their suddenly springing up: nevertheless I found that he does go a long way in believing that they do sometimes lie buried from cases which he had himself seen.—

Farewell | C. Darwin