een ill.

LETTER 553. TO J.D. HOOKER. [June 2nd, 1847.]

I received your letter the other day, full of curious facts, almost all
new to me, on the coal-question. (553/1. Sir Joseph Hooker deals with
the formation of coal in his classical paper "On the Vegetation of the
Carboniferous Period, as compared with that of the Present Day." "Mem.
Geol. Surv. Great Britain," Volume II., pt. ii., 1848.) I will bring
your note to Oxford (553/2. The British Association met at Oxford in
1847.), and then we will talk it over. I feel pretty sure that some of
your purely geological difficulties are easily solvable, and I can, I
think, throw a very little light on the shell difficulty. Pray put
no stress in your mind about the alternate, neatly divided, strata of
sandstone and shale, etc. I feel the same sort of interest in the coal
question as a man does watching two good players at play, he knowing
little or nothing of the game. I confess your last letter (and this
you will think very strange) has almost raised Binney's notion (an old,
growing hobby-horse of mine) to the dignity of an hypothesis (553/3.
Binney suggested that the Coal-plants grew in salt water. (See Letters
102, 552.) Recent investigations have shown that several of the plants
of the Coal period possessed certain anatomical peculiarities, which
indicate xerophytic characteristics, and lend support to the view that
some at least of the plants grew in seashore swamps.), though very far
yet below the promotion of being properly called a theory.

I will bring the remainder of my species-sketch to Oxford to go over
your remarks. I have lately been getting a good many rich facts. I saw
the poor old Dean of Manchester (553/4. Dean Herbert.) on Friday, and
he received me very kindly. He looked dreadfully ill, and about an hour
afterwards died! I am most sincerely sorry for it.

LETTER 554. TO J.D. HOOKER. [May 12th, 1847.]

I cannot resist thanking you for your most kind note. Pray do not
think that I was annoyed by your letter. I perceived that you had been
thinking with animation, and accordingly expressed yourself strongly,
and so I understood it. Forefend me from a man who weighs every
expression with Scotch prudence. I heartily wish you all success in your
noble problem, and I shall be very curious to have some talk with you
and hear your ultimatum. (554/1. The above paragraph was published in
"Life and Letters," I., page 359.) I do really think, after Binney's
p