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Collecting
- Butterfly specimens showing Batesian mimicry
- Butterfly specimens showing sexual dimorphism
- Specimens of birdwing butterflies (Papilionidae)
- Specimens of Asian beetles
- Specimens of bugs, crickets and other insects
- Specimens of stick and leaf insects, and a stag-horned deer-fly and other insects
- Specimen pieces of bird and marsupial skin
- Specimens of dead leaf butterflies and Trogonoptera brookiana
- Collecting and sending insects to Bates
- Collecting insects in Wales
- Designing an insect cabinet
- Exchanging insect lists with Bates and keeping a journal
- Herbert Wallace collecting in Brazil
- Fish drawing from the Rio Negro - Curimata species
- Descriptions of fishes from the Upper Rio Negro - Curimata species
- Fish drawing from the Upper Rio Negro - Ageneiosus species
- Descriptions of fishes from the Rio Negro - Ageneiosus species
- Wallace is shipwrecked and loses his collections
- The start of Wallace's Malay Archipelago expedition
- Collecting insects in Singapore
- Collecting insects in Malacca and Mount Ophir
- Qualities of a good field assistant and hand-rearing an orang-utan
- Collecting in Borneo and the departure of his assistant
- The insect life of the Malay Archipelago
- Notes on birds in Macassar
- List of expedition food supplies
- Insects and their colouring
- Wallace on biogeography
- Payment to Wallace by the British Museum
- Problems with the British Museum paying Wallace
- Insect list from the Malay Archipelago
- The Malay Archipelago book - map and dedication
- Photograph of Fred Birch
- Evolution
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The start of Wallace's Malay Archipelago expedition
Catalogue number: WP1/3/28
Letter from Wallace to his mother describing the people and wildlife of Singapore, staying with a missionary and the progress of his assistant Charles, dated April 1854.
Wallace wrote this letter to his mother a few days after arriving in Singapore. This was the start of his expedition around the Malay Archipelago.
Wallace described the variety of people living in Singapore, and his stay with a missionary who was 'a very pleasant man'. Wallace had barely started collecting insects but said they were plentiful in the area. As for other wildlife, he says 'I have not seen any tigers yet and do not expect to, for there are not many in this neighbourhood...'
Wallace also comments on his new assistant Charles Allen. 'He is quite well in health and catches a few insects, but he is very untidy which you may imagine by his clothes being all torn to pieces by the time we arrived here.' Wallace expected Charles to improve but he did not. Wallace did not suffer fools gladly. He was a polite and caring man, but expected high standards to equal his own.
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Wallace Letters Online
View high resolution scans and transcripts of Alfred Russel Wallace's correspondence, including all surviving letters between him and Charles Darwin.