Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1, page 169 by James Marchant
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satisfactorily to you, and hope you will not be so very sparing of criticism as you usually are.
I hope you are getting on well with your great book. I hear a rumour that we are to have one vol. of it about Christmas.
I quite forget whether I told you that I have a little boy, now three months old, and have named him Herbert Spencer (having had a brother Herbert). I am now staying chiefly in the country, at Hurstpierpoint, but come up to town once a month at least. You may address simply, "Hurstpierpoint, Sussex."
Hoping your health is tolerable and that all your family are well, believe me, dear Darwin, yours very faithfully,
ALFRED R. WALLACE.
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_Down, Bromley, Kent, S.E. October 12 and 13, 1867._
My dear Wallace,--I ordered the journal a long time ago, but by some oversight received it only yesterday and read it. You will think my praise not worth having from being so indiscriminate, but if I am to speak the truth, I must say I admire every word.
You have just touched on the points which I particularly wished to see noticed. I am glad you had the courage to take up _Angræcum_[62] after the Duke's attack; for I believe the principle in this case may be widely applied. I like the figure, but I wish the artist had drawn a better sphinx.
With respect to beauty, your remarks on hideous objects and on flowers not being made beautiful except when of practical use to them strike me as very good.
On this one point of beauty, I can hardly think that the Duke was quite candid. I have used in the concluding paragraph of my present book precisely the same argument as you have, even bringing in the bulldog,[63] with respect to variations not having been specially ordained. Your metaphor of the river[64] is new to me, and admirable; but your other metaphor, in which you compare classification and complex machines, does not seem to me quite appropriate, though I cannot point out what seems deficient. The point which seems to