Again thanking you for your kindness, believe me yours very faithfully,
ALFRED R. WALLACE.
* * * * *
_Down, Beckenham, Kent. January 10, 1881._
My dear Wallace,--I am heartily glad that you are pleased about the
memorial.
I do not feel that my opinion is worth much on the point which you
mention. A relation who is in a Government office and whose judgment, I
think, may be fully trusted, felt sure that if you received an official
announcement without any private note, it ought to be answered
officially, but if the case were mine, I would express whatever I
thought and felt in an official document. His reason was that Gladstone
gives or recommends the pension on public grounds alone.
If the case were mine I would not write to signers of the memorial,
because I believe that they acted like so many jurymen in a claim
against the Government. Nevertheless, if I met any of them or was
writing to them on any other subject, I should take the opportunity of
expressing my feelings. I think you might with propriety write to
Huxley, as he entered so heartily into the scheme and aided in the most
important manner in many ways.
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