“DEAR MR. MELDOLA,--It is very kind of you to offer to send me the book, but I feel sure that it could not have belonged to my grandfather.--My eldest brother’s name is Erasmus and he attended to chemistry when young, and I suppose that the ‘Annals of Philosophy’ was left at my Father’s house and sold with the Library which belonged to my sisters.--I will look to the few words of Preface to Wiesmann [_sic_], whenever I receive a proof.--With many thanks.-- “Yours very faithfully, “CH. DARWIN.” Then followed a brief note dated “Aug. 8, 1881,” referring to some point in the work upon which Meldola was then engaged, and which cannot now be ascertained. Another letter of the same date referred to the translation of Weismann, and contained some encouraging words upon the interest created by the work and upon the success of the Essex Field Club, in which Meldola had taken a leading part. Another brief note of August 10th, 1881, apparently refers to some paper which cannot now be identified. The following interesting letter is of uncertain date:-- “_? 19th, ? 1881._ “Down. “DEAR MR. MELDOLA,--When I read the F. M. [Fritz Müller] paper your doubt occurred to me and I must say this, I would rather have expected that the knowledge of distasteful caterpillars would have been inherited, but I distinctly remember an account (when Wallace first propounded his warning colors) published of some birds, I think turkeys, being experimented upon and they shook their heads after trying some caterpillars as if they had a horrid taste in their mouths. I fancied this thing was published by Mr. Weir or could it have been by Mr. Butler? It would be well to look in Mr. Belt’s ‘Nicaragua’ as he tried some experiments. I am not sure that there is not some statement of the kind in it. “Yours faithfully, “CHARLES DARWIN. “I daresay Mr. Wallace or Bates would remember the statement of some birds shaking their heads to which I refer.” The statement about the turkeys evidently refers to Stainton’s experiment with young birds of this kind, which immediately devoured numerous protectively coloured moths, but, after seizing, invariably rejected, a conspicuous white species (_Spilosoma menthastri_). It was Belt’s ducks which shook their heads after tasting a very conspicuous Nicaraguan frog. Darwin wished to show by this evidence that there was no instinctive knowledge such as would have saved the birds from an evidently unpleasant experience.