Good-bye my dear Hooker, I can assure [you] that we both most truly enjoyed your and Mrs. Hooker's visit here. Farewell.
My dear Hooker, your sincere friend, C. DARWIN.
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.D. HOOKER. March 7 [1855].
...I have just finished working well at Wollaston's (Thomas Vernon Wollaston died (in his fifty-seventh year, as I believe) on January 4, 1878. His health forcing him in early manhood to winter in the south, he devoted himself to a study of the Coleoptera of Madeira, the Cape de Verdes, and St. Helena, whence he deduced evidence in support of the belief in the submerged continent of 'Atlantis.' In an obituary notice by Mr. Rye ('Nature,' 1878) he is described as working persistently "upon a broad conception of the science to which he was devoted," while being at the same time "accurate, elaborate, and precise ad punctum, and naturally of a minutely critical habit." His first scientific paper was written when he was an undergraduate at Jesus College, Cambridge. While at the University, he was an Associate and afterwards a Member of the Ray Club: this is a small society which still meets once a week, and where the undergraduate members, or Associates, receive much kindly encouragement from their elders.) 'Insecta Maderensia': it is an ADMIRABLE work. There is a very curious point in the astounding proportion of Coleoptera that are apterous; and I think I have guessed the reason, viz., that powers of flight would be injurious to insects inhabiting a confined locality, and expose them to be blown to the sea: to test this, I find that the insects inhabiting the Dezerte Grande, a quite small islet, would be still more exposed to this danger, and here the proportion of apterous insects is even considerably greater than on Madeira Proper. Wollaston speaks of Madeira and the other