I hope our first discussion has convinced you that we want nothing but to achieve something useful. And as I have at any rate learned how to recognise practical knowledge and common sense, when I meet with them (they are not so common as people imagine) you will find me always ready to do my best to aid in carrying out your views. You really know more about the business than all the rest of us put together.
Yours very truly,
T. H. Huxley.
While Miss Ormerod was associated with the Bethnal Green Museum she was asked to look at the proofs of a series of insect diagrams illustrating “Gardeners’ Friends and Foes” being prepared for publication by the Science and Art Department. She found that an official of the Museum had been guilty of wholesale plagiarism, both in the coloured figures and the descriptive letterpress, and moreover that a number of figures of a popular kind had been introduced which were not drawn with scientific accuracy, that she felt conscientiously impelled to report the irregularities and deficiencies to the authorities. The results were that the diagrams were withdrawn (only a few sets having been presented for private use to certain fortunate individuals); and the removal of the official from the position of trust became a wholesome lesson to those who lightly make use without acknowledgment of the work of others.
At a later date she arranged the descriptive matter of a series of beautiful insect diagrams, the originals of which were drawn and coloured by her sister, Georgiana, for the Royal Agricultural Society, and referred to in the appended facsimile page of a letter addressed to the present writer, and again at p. 210 of her correspondence.
An excellent specimen of Miss Ormerod’s clear and characteristic writing in which she conducted her voluminous correspondence.
May 12th 1891.
Torrington House St. Albans.
Dear Prof Wallace
Your letter was a great
pleasure to us, and my sister
was delighted to hope that
her diagrams may be of such
general use
I have now written to
Mr. Newman begging him to
write to you replying to
your enquiries,—and also
to send (to your kind acceptance
from my sister) by Parcel post
samples of the diagrams, so
far as they are printed
completely. That is with
the exception of the fly which
you have.
You ought I am sure to
see for yourself just what
it is that we are about