oncur.[50] I
see you were at the British Association, but I have heard nothing of it
except what I have picked up in the _Reader_. I have heard a rumour that
the _Reader_ is sold to the Anthropological Society. If you do not
begrudge the trouble of another note (for my sole channel of news
through Hooker is closed by his illness), I should much like to hear
whether the _Reader_ is thus sold. I should be very sorry for it, as the
paper would thus become sectional in its tendency. If you write, tell me
what you are doing yourself.

The only news which I have about the "Origin" is that Fritz Mueller
published a few months ago a remarkable book[51] in its favour, and
secondly that a second French edition is just coming out.--Believe me,
dear Wallace, yours very sincerely,

CH. DARWIN.

* * * * *

_9 St. Mark's Crescent, Regents Park. October 2, 1865._

Dear Darwin,--I was just leaving town for a few days when I received
your letter, or should have replied at once.

The _Reader_ has no doubt changed hands, and I am inclined to think for
the better. It is purchased, I believe, by a gentleman who is a Fellow
of the Anthropological Society, but I see no signs of its being made a
special organ of that Society. The Editor (and, I believe, proprietor)
is a Mr. Bendyshe, the most talented man in the Society, and, judging
from his speaking, which I have often heard, I should say the articles
on "Simeon and Simony," "Metropolitan Sewage," and "France and Mexico,"
are his, and these are in my opinion superior to anything that has been
in the _Reader_ for a long time; they have the point and brilliancy
which are wanted to make leading articles readable and popular. The
articles on Mill's Political Economy and on Mazzini are also first-rate.
He has introduced also the plan of having two, and now three, important
articles in each number--one political or social, one literary, and one
scientific. Under the old regime they never had an editor above
mediocrity, except Masson (? Musson); there was a want of unity among
the proprietors as to the aims and objects of the journal; and there was
a want of capital to secure the services of good writers. This seems to
me to be now all changed for the better, and I only hope the rumour of
that _bete noire_, the Anthropological Society, having anything to do
with it may not cause our best men of science to withdraw their support
and contributions.

I have read