It is a very interesting subject, but I shall not be able to go on with
it for the next five or six months, as I am fully employed in correcting
dull proof-sheets; when I return to the work I shall find it much better
done by you than I could have succeeded in doing.
With many thanks for your very interesting note, believe me, dear
Wallace, yours very sincerely,
CH. DARWIN.
It is curious how we hit on the same ideas. I have endeavoured to show
in my MS. discussion that nearly the same principles account for young
birds _not_ being gaily coloured in many cases--but this is too complex
a point for a note.
_Postscript. Down. April 29._
My dear Wallace,--On reading over your letter again, and on further
reflection, I do not think (as far as I remember my words) that I
expressed myself _nearly strongly_ enough as to the value and beauty of
your generalisation, viz. that all birds in which the female is
conspicuously or brightly coloured build in holes or under domes. I
thought that this was the explanation in many, perhaps most cases, but
do not think I should ever have extended my view to your generalisation.
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