My dear Farrer

I have read with much interest your article.² It certainly is a very curious case. The older I grow the more I become impressed with the endless & unfathomable fluctuations of structure.— I do not much like C. Emerus; if I understand rightly the bowing of the claw of the vexillum becomes the sole adaptation for getting honey on the outside of the flower.³ I wonder whether other Pap. flowers have an elongated claw. Hooker will be here next Saturday & I will ask him.⁴

The only case, at all analogous to yours, of which I can think is Marcgravia of S. America, which has its sepals or bracts (I forget which) modified into nectariferous tubes, so placed that the visitors brush against the stamens & stigmas.⁵ As I have often said, you were a born naturalist.—

Yours most sincerely | Ch. Darwin