skip to content

Darwin Correspondence Project

From Robert Bateman   [28 January 1862]1

Biddulph Grange, | Congleton.

Tuesday.

Dear Sir.

My father being obliged to leave home early this morning was unable to answer your note which he hopes to do tomorrow.2 Meanwhile he bids me to send you three other species which he hopes will be of service, namely a Phaius, Leptotes & Goodyera.3 The names of the orchids of which you send notes are the following.

1. “Labellum pale spotted with purple, sepals & petals green with purple spots”

Zygopetalum crinitum.

2. Odontoglossum Bictoniense.

3. Odontoglossum pulchellum

4   Calanthe vestita.

5. Purple Cattleya-like flower

Laelia anceps.

6   The Angræcum is a A. Sesquipedale & is from

Madagascar

Believe me | Dear Sir | Yrs very truly | Robert Bateman.

to Dr Darwin.

CD annotations

Verso of first page: ‘Phaius like Cattleya | Leptotes like Cattleya | I shall have to add several genera to Foreign Orchids’ pencil 4

Footnotes

Dated by reference to CD’s commenting in the letter to J. D. Hooker, 25 [and 26] January [1862] that he had just received a box of orchids from James Bateman, Robert Bateman’s father, that included a specimen of Angraecum sesquipedale. The following Tuesday was 28 January.
See n. 1, above. CD’s letter to James Bateman has not been found. For Bateman’s reply, see the letter from James Bateman, [1 February 1862].
James Bateman’s assistance in providing orchid specimens is acknowledged in Orchids, pp. 114 n., 158 n., and 197).
CD mentioned the similarity between the general manner of fertilisation of Leptotes, Phaius, and Cattleya in Orchids, p. 164.

Bibliography

Orchids: On the various contrivances by which British and foreign orchids are fertilised by insects, and on the good effects of intercrossing. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1862.

Summary

For his father [James Bateman], he sends three more species of orchids and names of others described by CD.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-3357
From
Robert Bateman
To
Charles Robert Darwin
Sent from
Congleton
Source of text
DAR 160.1: 60
Physical description
ALS 2pp †

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 3357,” accessed on 23 November 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-3357.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 10

letter