- Home >
- Nature online >
- Collections at the Museum >
- Wallace Collection >
- Themes >
- Collecting
Primary navigation
- Collections at the Museum
- Wallace Collection
- Introduction
- Online collection
- Architecture
- Biography
-
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
- Family
- Naturalist
- Social issues
- Spiritualism
- Search
Collecting in Borneo and the departure of his assistant
Catalogue number: WP1/3/37
Letter from Wallace to his sister Fanny about his assistant leaving and successful collecting in Borneo, dated February 1856.
Wallace wrote to his sister on his return to Singapore, following a collecting trip to Borneo. He describes his foot infection and his pleasant stay with Sir James Brooke in Sarawak. Sir James Brooke was the Rajah of Sarawak, who worked hard to protect the indigenous people against exploitation. Wallace says he was 'a gentleman and a nobleman'.
He tells Fanny that his assistant Charles Allen had left him, staying in Borneo to teach with the Bishop of Sarawak. Wallace had mixed feelings, despite extensive complaints about Charles in previous letters. 'I hardly know whether to be glad or sorry he has left', he admits. 'I feel it quite a relief without him he had just begun to be valuable in collecting.' Perhaps Wallace grew to like Charles after all, despite his faults.
Wallace remarks that collecting in Borneo was very good. He collected 'upwards of 25,000 insects', in addition to birds, mammals and plants. This is an amazing amount. He was probably the most prolific collectors of his time. Wallace kept some specimens for his own private collection and relied on selling the rest to pay for his voyages.
Toolbox
Contact us
For enquiries about the Wallace Collection please email the library
Search this collection
Wallace Letters Online
View high resolution scans and transcripts of Alfred Russel Wallace's correspondence, including all surviving letters between him and Charles Darwin.