Transcribe Ward, Henry A. Letter to Brooks, Gary (1877-09-01)

[another hand vertically in right margin- 70 </u Brooks > Gary Sept '77] Rochester, N.Z. </s Aug 3 > Sept 1 '77 Mr Garry Brooks. Fairport Dear Sir,

  I had hoped to have called upon you sometime during

the present week, but as I go ? South this evening I shall be unable to do so. The purpose of my visit </s which I will now undertake by letter > was to present to you a few points in relation to the great cabinets fur- nished </s and > by your late brother - Mr Levi Brooks - to the University of Virginia. These cabinets, together with the building to contain them, you have doubtless seen frequently described in our public journals. They are of themselves very large and extensive in their array of Natural Material. No cabinets in the South, and but very few anywhere in the United States, equal them in this respect. Yet still their great value </s and this is a point of mine of which Mr Brooks especially offered, is that> not so much even their great size as it is </s that > the </u completeness > with which every leading point of the series undertaken is represented. To this point of full and even re- presentation </s Mr Brooks > as aimed at by me Mr Brooks gave his es- pecial approval. The hundred items of detail composing it have been the successive subjects of our discussion during the last year and a half. He constantly surprised me by his close attention to the really technical and scientific details of the enterprise. It seemed to me that there was no subject of which he so loved to talk during the past year - and particularly during the last three months