Under the name of Cedrus atlantica the tree occurs in mass on the borders of Tunis, and as Deodar it first appears to the east in the cedar forests of Afghanistan. Sir J.D. Hooker supposes that, during a period of greater cold, the cedars on the Taurus and on Lebanon lived many thousand feet nearer the sea-level, and spread much farther to the east, meeting similar belts of trees descending and spreading westward from Afghanistan along the Persian mountains.) I know of nothing that gives one such an idea of the recent mutations in the surface of the land as these living "outlyers." In the geological sense we must, I suppose, admit that every yard of land has been successively covered with a beech forest between the Caucasus and Japan! I have not yet seen (for I have not sent to the station) Falconer's works. When you say that you sigh to think how poor your reprinted memoirs would appear, on my soul I should like to shake you till your bones rattled for talking such nonsense. Do you sigh over the "Insular Floras," the Introduction to New Zealand Flora, to Australia, your Arctic Flora, and dear Galapagos, etc., etc., etc.? In imagination I am grinding my teeth and choking you till I put sense into you. Farewell. I have amused myself by writing an audaciously long letter. By the way, we heard yesterday that George has won the second Smith's Prize, which I am excessively glad of, as the Second Wrangler by no means always succeeds. The examination consists exclusively of [the] most difficult subjects, which such men as Stokes, Cayley, and Adams can set. LETTER 385. A.R. WALLACE TO CHARLES DARWIN. March 8th, 1868. ...While writing a few pages on the northern alpine forms of plants on the Java mountains I wanted a few cases to refer to like Teneriffe, where there are no northern forms and scarcely any alpine. I expected the volcanoes of Hawaii would be a good case, and asked Dr. Seemann about them. It seems a man has lately published a list of Hawaiian plants, and the mountains swarm with European alpine genera and some species! (385/1. "This turns out to be inaccurate, or greatly exaggerated. There are no true alpines, and the European genera are comparatively few. See my 'Island Life,' page 323."--A.R.W.) Is not this most extraordinary, and a puzzler? They are, I believe, truly oceanic islands, in the absence of mammals and the extreme poverty of birds and insects, and they are within the Tropics. Will not that be a hard nut for you when you come to treat in detail on geographical distribution? I enclose Seemann's note, which please return when you have copied the list, if of any use to you. LETTER 386. TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, February 21st [1870].