Hagenbeck requests that Ewart repay him some expenses incurred transporting two zebra hybrids to India. He also informs him that he is sending a wild ass from the Balkasch lake to the Duke of Bedford. He describes the animal, stating that to him it resembles a new species, and asks if Ewart would view it and offer his opinion.

Osborn states that the pony has arrived safely in New York. He will have the animal photographed for Ewart soon. He mentions not having read the papers by Mendel and Bateson. He announces that he will be writing to the Duke of Bedford to say that he would be interested in receiving the skeleton of one of his Russian horses if one should die. He also states that James Gidley is revising the species of their miocene, and he criticises Othniel Charles Marsh's phylogeny.