Collecting in Borneo and the departure of his assistant
Full transcription
Singapore Feb 20th. 1856.
My dear Fanny
I have now left Sarawak, where I began to feel quite at home & may perhaps never return to it again but I shall always look back with pleasure to my residence there & to my acquaintance with Sir James Brooke, who is a gentleman & a nobleman in the noblest sense of both words. I have just got yours & Thomas' letter of Nov. 30th. My foot got well at last after keeping me 3 months in the house. Camphor ointment did no good at all. Another time I shall use caustic which is the only thing in this country to make bad wounds heal.
I am sorry to hear you are not well. I hope you will not work too hard but take a days rest now and then and you should arrange to spend from Saturday afternoon to Monday morning in the country. Why did not mother get a cottage & not take more rooms in London which I am sure she does not like so well as the country. I wish you would write me some more details of your business what are your highest prices, what is the most you take in a day &c. &c. I suppose Thomas & you have been to see Fenton's Crimea Photographs - the first great application of Photography to Life & History. Do the transparent pictures for the gas microscope go on. No sooner do you seem to have got something new then not a word more about it.
Charles has left me. He has staid [sic] with the Bishop at Sarawak who wants teachers & is going to try to educate him for me. I offered to take him on with me paying him a fair price for all the insects &c. he collected, but he preferred to stay. I hardly know whether to be glad or sorry he has left. It saves me a great deal of trouble & annoyance & I feel it quite a relief to be without him. On the other hand it is a considerable loss for me, as he had just begun to be valuable in collecting. I must now try & teach a China boy to collect & pin insects. My collections in Borneo have been very good, but some of them will I fear be injured by the long voyages of the ship. I have collected upwards of 25,000 insects besides Birds shells quadrupeds & plants.
The day I arrived here a vessel sailed for Macassar & I fear I shall not have another chance for two months unless I go a roundabout way & perhaps not then. So I have hardly made up my mind what to do. The January Mail is expected in daily so I may receive another letter from you before I send this. I have spoken to the Rajah about G. Silk. If matters go on well with the English Government there may be work for him here in a year or two. I shall write to him by this mail. This letter must do for all, as I have no time to write separately. I have sent a paper on Borneo & the Dyaks to the Geographical Society. You will hear from G.S. when it is to be read & perhaps would like to go & hear it, as I have endeavoured to make it a little amusing and readable which the papers at the Geog. are not always.
I think this war is a noble and a necessary one & it is only by its being thorough & complete that it can effect its purpose & leave the future peace of Europe. The warlike stores found accumulated at Sebastopol are alone a sufficient justification of the war. What were 4000 cannons for and other stores in proportion, if not to take Constantinople & get a footing in the Mediterranean, & ultimately to subjugate Europe? And why do such tremendous fortresses exist in every part of the frontiers of Russia, if not to render herself invulnerable from attacks which she has determined by her ambitious designs to bring upon herself Russia is perpetually increasing her means of defence & of aggression; if she had continued unmolested a few years longer, it would have cost still greater sacrifices to subdue her. The war therefore is absolutely necessary as the only means of teaching Russia that Europe will not submit to the indefinite increase of her territory & power, & the constant menace of her thousands of cannons & millions of men. It is the only means of saving Europe from a despotism as much worse than that of Napoleon as the Russian people are behind the French, in civilization.
Kind love to mother, Thomas, Mr. & Mrs. Sims, Webster & to all friends.
In haste
Your affectionate Brother
[signed] Alfred R. Wallace
[written perpendicular to the address]
My dear Mother
I will write to you next time. Kind love from
Your affectionate Son
[signed] Alfred R Wallace
My dear Fanny
I have now left Sarawak, where I began to feel quite at home & may perhaps never return to it again but I shall always look back with pleasure to my residence there & to my acquaintance with Sir James Brooke, who is a gentleman & a nobleman in the noblest sense of both words. I have just got yours & Thomas' letter of Nov. 30th. My foot got well at last after keeping me 3 months in the house. Camphor ointment did no good at all. Another time I shall use caustic which is the only thing in this country to make bad wounds heal.
I am sorry to hear you are not well. I hope you will not work too hard but take a days rest now and then and you should arrange to spend from Saturday afternoon to Monday morning in the country. Why did not mother get a cottage & not take more rooms in London which I am sure she does not like so well as the country. I wish you would write me some more details of your business what are your highest prices, what is the most you take in a day &c. &c. I suppose Thomas & you have been to see Fenton's Crimea Photographs - the first great application of Photography to Life & History. Do the transparent pictures for the gas microscope go on. No sooner do you seem to have got something new then not a word more about it.
Charles has left me. He has staid [sic] with the Bishop at Sarawak who wants teachers & is going to try to educate him for me. I offered to take him on with me paying him a fair price for all the insects &c. he collected, but he preferred to stay. I hardly know whether to be glad or sorry he has left. It saves me a great deal of trouble & annoyance & I feel it quite a relief to be without him. On the other hand it is a considerable loss for me, as he had just begun to be valuable in collecting. I must now try & teach a China boy to collect & pin insects. My collections in Borneo have been very good, but some of them will I fear be injured by the long voyages of the ship. I have collected upwards of 25,000 insects besides Birds shells quadrupeds & plants.
The day I arrived here a vessel sailed for Macassar & I fear I shall not have another chance for two months unless I go a roundabout way & perhaps not then. So I have hardly made up my mind what to do. The January Mail is expected in daily so I may receive another letter from you before I send this. I have spoken to the Rajah about G. Silk. If matters go on well with the English Government there may be work for him here in a year or two. I shall write to him by this mail. This letter must do for all, as I have no time to write separately. I have sent a paper on Borneo & the Dyaks to the Geographical Society. You will hear from G.S. when it is to be read & perhaps would like to go & hear it, as I have endeavoured to make it a little amusing and readable which the papers at the Geog. are not always.
I think this war is a noble and a necessary one & it is only by its being thorough & complete that it can effect its purpose & leave the future peace of Europe. The warlike stores found accumulated at Sebastopol are alone a sufficient justification of the war. What were 4000 cannons for and other stores in proportion, if not to take Constantinople & get a footing in the Mediterranean, & ultimately to subjugate Europe? And why do such tremendous fortresses exist in every part of the frontiers of Russia, if not to render herself invulnerable from attacks which she has determined by her ambitious designs to bring upon herself Russia is perpetually increasing her means of defence & of aggression; if she had continued unmolested a few years longer, it would have cost still greater sacrifices to subdue her. The war therefore is absolutely necessary as the only means of teaching Russia that Europe will not submit to the indefinite increase of her territory & power, & the constant menace of her thousands of cannons & millions of men. It is the only means of saving Europe from a despotism as much worse than that of Napoleon as the Russian people are behind the French, in civilization.
Kind love to mother, Thomas, Mr. & Mrs. Sims, Webster & to all friends.
In haste
Your affectionate Brother
[signed] Alfred R. Wallace
[written perpendicular to the address]
My dear Mother
I will write to you next time. Kind love from
Your affectionate Son
[signed] Alfred R Wallace
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