Now for pleasanter subjects; we were all amused at your defence of stamp collecting and collecting generally... But, by Jove, I can hardly stomach a grown man collecting stamps. Who would ever have thought of your collecting Wedgwoodware! but that is wholly different, like engravings or pictures. We are degenerate descendants of old Josiah W., for we have not a bit of pretty ware in the house. ... Notwithstanding the very pleasant reason you give for our not enjoying a holiday, namely, that we have no vices, it is a horrid bore. I have been trying for health's sake to be idle, with no success. What I shall now have to do, will be to erect a tablet in Down Church, "Sacred to the Memory, etc.," and officially die, and then publish books, "by the late Charles Darwin," for I cannot think what has come over me of late; I always suffered from the excitement of talking, but now it has become ludicrous. I talked lately 1 1/2 hours (broken by tea by myself) with my nephew, and I was [ill] half the night. It is a fearful evil for self and family. Good-night. Ever yours. C. DARWIN. [The following letter to Sir Julius von Haast (Sir Julius von Haast was a German by birth, but had long been resident in New Zealand. He was, in 1862, Government Geologist to the Province of Canterbury.), is an example of the sympathy which he felt with the spread and growth of science in the colonies. It was a feeling not expressed once only, but was frequently present in his mind, and often found utterance. When we, at Cambridge, had the satisfaction of receiving Sir J. von Haast into our body as a Doctor of Science (July 1886), I had the opportunity of hearing from him of the vivid pleasure which this, and other letters from my father, gave him. It was pleasant to see how strong had been the impression made by my father's warm-hearted sympathy--an impression which seemed, after more than twenty years, to be as fresh as when it was first received:] CHARLES DARWIN TO JULIUS VON HAAST. Down, January 22 [1863]. Dear Sir,