My dear Lady Dorothy,

Our poor friend Henslow is still lingering on
and we are in daily, I may truly say in hourly,
expectation of hearing of his decease.
You have excelled in preparing skeleton leaves, I
know— and I have seen, I think, some foliage in the
early stage of the operation, in vessels of soft rain-
water, to remove by a putrefying process the pulpy
substance. A lady friend of mine wants to know the
further process for removing all the decaying matter
and leaving the fine in the beautifully clean state when
the operation is finished ? Is it chloride of hme, or
some bleaching fluid ?

I have at length a goodly number of cocoons, sent
out by the French Government to the Ionian Islands,
of the new Chinese silk-worm. Your Nephew, I think,
Mr. Drummond Wolff, ^ Civil Secretary there and

' Her cousin, the late Sir Henry Drummond Wolff,



68 LADY DOROTHY NEVILL

M. Meneville. I see the book is sold chez I'Auteur,
Rue des Beaux Arts, No. 4.
I have not the least idea what your silk-making
worm can be, as you may know I write for The Field. '
There is a gentleman who prides himself that he knows
everything. I will, with your permission, try him with
your question signing my own name, we will see what
he says.
Thanking you much for your kindness, j
Believe me,

Yours most obliged,

F. T. BUCKLAND.
Frank Buckland's sister, Mrs. Gordon, the wife of
the Vicar of Harting, a village not very far from
Dangstein, was a very clever and artistic woman of
whom my mother saw a great deal.
