From James Torbitt 18 September 1879
Summary
Illness of his wife.
Potato crossing experiments; believes he has increased yield considerably.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 18 Sept 1879 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 154 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12233 |
From James Torbitt 22 April 1876
Summary
Thanks for CD’s assistance and his advice on crossing.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 22 Apr 1876 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 135 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-10466 |
From James Torbitt 16 September 1878
Summary
Apologises for his error over the Solanum.
Thanks CD for his good wishes; JT believes he will increase yield and disease-resistance by his crossing and selection.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 16 Sept 1878 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 147 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-11696 |
From James Torbitt 6 March 1878
Summary
Problems of continuing with his crossing experiments; financial help from CD.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 6 Mar 1878 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 138 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-11403 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … Problems of continuing with his crossing experiments; financial help from CD. …
From James Torbitt 19 April 1876
Summary
JT’s crossing experiments on potatoes. Attempts to develop resistance to Peronospora.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 19 Apr 1876 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 134 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-10458 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … JT’s crossing experiments on potatoes. Attempts to develop resistance to Peronospora . …
From James Torbitt 15 March 1878
Summary
Potato crossing experiments. Encloses printed copies of letters from people who have grown his potato seed.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 15 Mar 1878 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 140 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-11426 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … Potato crossing experiments. Encloses printed copies of letters from people who have grown …
From James Torbitt 8 October 1878
Summary
Forwards letter from Victor Kennedy reporting on the growth of JT’s potatoes in W. Ireland.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 8 Oct 1878 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 148 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-11721 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 1878 ; CD had advised Torbitt on methods for crossing potatoes. This sentence was probably …
From James Torbitt 12 March 1880
Summary
Hopes to finish his report tomorrow; last year’s crosses were failures.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 12 Mar 1880 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 163 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12534 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … as last years seedlings second cross— The crossing attempted last year was a failure, none …
From James Torbitt 10 March 1881
Summary
Sends CD some samples of recent produce. Is "pretty well disgusted by the apathy and stupidity" he has encountered whilst trying to arouse interest and support for his work.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 10 Mar 1881 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 173, DAR 52: E6 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13083 |
From James Torbitt 5 March 1880
Summary
Is prepared to continue his work, if financial help is forthcoming.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 5 Mar 1880 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 162 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12517 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … best varieties of ’79, ’78 and ’77 for crossing so as to be prepared for continuance of …
From James Torbitt 26 September 1880
Summary
Has raised about 500 varieties out of the crop of the second generation comprising about 1500 varieties. Growers report immense yield and no disease. Doubts if variety free of disease will live for ever. New varieties must be continually coming into existence.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 26 Sept 1880 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 168 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12728 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 16 June 1880 . Torbitt was conducting crossing experiments to grow disease-resistant …
From James Torbitt 24 February 1878
Summary
Wants CD to forward to Chancellor of Exchequer a letter which explains the progress he has made in his potato crossing. Wants to print a CD letter to arouse public interest in the work.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 24 Feb 1878 |
| Classmark: | DAR 52: E2, DAR 178: 137 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-11373 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … the progress he has made in his potato crossing. Wants to print a CD letter to arouse …
From James Torbitt 4 November 1879
Summary
Success of his experiments; report on recent work.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 4 Nov 1879 |
| Classmark: | DAR 52: E3; DAR 178: 155 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12292 |
From James Torbitt 13 May 1880
Summary
Has planted six, as opposed to eleven acres last year, to keep within expenditure. Must pollen be used immediately? Fourteen landowners are growing potatoes for JT.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 13 May 1880 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 165 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12605 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … within the limit. For the purpose of crossing, I have planted some of the best tubers of …
From James Torbitt 7 June 1880
Summary
Sets out specific propositions concerning his potato varieties, which he will make to the Government, if he is given CD’s and T. H. Farrer’s support.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 7 June 1880 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 166 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12622 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … had asked CD whether the pollen used in crossing potatoes would live for a few days, or …
From James Torbitt 30 April 1879
Summary
Has had an account of his experiments published. Sends CD some specimens of seedlings and tubers.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 30 Apr 1879 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 152 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12020 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … I suppose was [6 words illeg] the crossing. I presume the [‘great’ del ] extraordinary …
From James Torbitt 20 November 1879
Summary
Intends to get his ideas on the "wearing out" of varieties printed.
This year’s crosses were failures.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 20 Nov 1879 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 157 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12332 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … the first, fourth, and fifth years. The crossing, this year was a complete failure. I had …
From James Torbitt 14 June 1880
Summary
JT attempting to get Government backing for his experiments; wishes to quote from CD’s letter in support of his work.
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 14 June 1880 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 167 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12635 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … growing healthily, as are the plants for crossing, and the 6 acres new vars. The 14 acres …
From James Torbitt 1 May 1879
Summary
Describes one of his varieties of potato in its third and fourth years. [CD notes his observations on this variety grown at Down, July 1879.]
| Author: | James Torbitt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 1 May 1879 |
| Classmark: | DAR 178: 153 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12023 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … ripe I had it raised, and for purpose of crossing, kept it under lock, and planted it last …
| letter | (19) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (19) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (19) |
| Torbitt, James | (19) |
Darwin's 1876 letters online
Summary
Birth, tragic death . . . and cardigan jackets. To mark the 211th anniversary of Darwin's birth, we have released online the transcripts and footnotes of over 460 letters written to and from him in 1876 and a supplement of 180 letters written before…
Matches: 1 hits
- … I am now getting ready a book on the advantages of crossing, which will be a sort of complement to …
Darwin in letters, 1864: Failing health
Summary
On receiving a photograph from Charles Darwin, the American botanist Asa Gray wrote on 11 July 1864: ‘the venerable beard gives the look of your having suffered, and … of having grown older’. Because of poor health, Because of poor health, Darwin…
Matches: 6 hits
- … him to carry out tasks like counting seeds of Lythrum , crossing cowslips with polyanthuses, and …
- … a full conviction of the change of species is.’ Crossing experiments In addition to …
- … Continuing from these earlier studies, in 1864 he conducted crossing experiments between different …
- … other papers of Scott’s followed, reporting the results of crossing experiments on different species …
- … years, Darwin consulted Charles William Crocker about his crossing experiments with hollyhocks, and …
- … and Friedrich Hildebrand in Germany compared results of crossing experiments with a Pulmonaria …
Cross and self fertilisation
Summary
The effects of cross and self fertilisation in the vegetable kingdom, published on 10 November 1876, was the result of a decade-long project to provide evidence for Darwin’s belief that ‘‘Nature thus tells us, in the most emphatic manner, that she abhors…
Matches: 9 hits
- … to James Moggridge to ask him to observe whether spontaneous crossing of different varieties of this …
- … I got fresh plants, & consequently took up the effect of crossing & self-fertilising plants …
- … in Florence kept varieties of sweet peas separated to avoid crossing ( From Federico Delpino, 18 …
- … native Mediterranean setting. Although he continued his crossing experiments through the early …
- … what great vigour is given to seedling plants by the crossing of their parents’ ( To Fritz Müller, …
- … & have strength to complete it) will be on the advantages of Crossing Plants, & this will …
- … Meehan had been a vocal opponent of Darwin’s views on crossing, and his paper, ‘Are insects any …
- … press observations continued for 10 years on the effects of crossing plants, & I think that …
- … inferred from observations on self fertilising plants that crossing was of little importance …
Forms of flowers
Summary
Darwin’s book The different forms of flowers on plants of the same species, published in 1877, investigated the structural differences in the sexual organs of flowers of the same species. It drew on and expanded five articles Darwin had published on the…
Matches: 5 hits
- … whether hybrid sterility was the inevitable result of crossing species. Thomas Huxley had stated …
- … stigmas ’. Darwin had hoped to publish the results of the crossing experiments immediately, but by …
- … 1863, when Lythrum was flowering, Darwin resumed his crossing experiments. He also wrote to …
- … of the various crosses. For this, he turned to his earlier crossing experiments, which included some …
- … adding this work to his book on ‘the good effects of crossing’ ( Cross and self fertilisation ), …
Orchids
Summary
Why Orchids? Darwin wrote in his Autobiography, ‘During the summer of 1839, and, I believe, during the previous summer, I was led to attend to the cross-fertilisation of flowers by the aid of insects, from having come to the conclusion in my…
Matches: 1 hits
- … conclusion in my speculations on the origin of species, that crossing played an important part in …
1877 letters now online
Summary
Flowers, bloom, a son married . . . and a suspended monkey in Cambridge at Darwin's honorary LLD ceremony. The transcripts and footnotes of over 600 letters written to and from Darwin in 1877 are now online. Read more about Darwin's life in 1877…
Darwin in letters, 1877: Flowers and honours
Summary
Ever since the publication of Expression, Darwin’s research had centred firmly on botany. The year 1877 was no exception. The spring and early summer were spent completing Forms of flowers, his fifth book on a botanical topic. He then turned to the…
Matches: 3 hits
- … was only one of many adaptations that had evolved to promote crossing between individuals of the …
- … males and females of unisexual animals. Through extensive crossing experiments, and painstaking …
- … a number of other structures and behaviours that facilitated crossing, especially with the aid of …
Darwin in letters, 1876: In the midst of life
Summary
1876 was the year in which the Darwins became grandparents for the first time. And tragically lost their daughter-in-law, Amy, who died just days after her son's birth. All the letters from 1876 are now published in volume 24 of The Correspondence…
Matches: 4 hits
- … the text. Orchids , which concentrated on the ‘means of crossing’, was seen by Darwin as the …
- … , which provided evidence for the ‘advantages of crossing’ (letter to Asa Gray, 28 January 1876). …
- … before a disease-free variety of potato had been produced by crossing the most pest-free varieties …
- … self-fertilisation To demonstrate the advantages of crossing, Darwin presented the results …
Dates of composition of Darwin's manuscript on species
Summary
Many of the dates of letters in 1856 and 1857 were based on or confirmed by reference to Darwin’s manuscript on species (DAR 8--15.1, inclusive; transcribed and published as Natural selection). This manuscript, begun in May 1856, was nearly completed by…
Matches: 1 hits
- … On the possibility of all organic beings occasionally crossing, & on the remarkable …
Floral Dimorphism
Summary
Sources|Discussion Questions|Experiment Floral studies In 1877 Darwin published a book that included a series of smaller studies on botanical subjects. Titled The different forms of flowers on plants of the same species, it consisted primarily of…
Matches: 1 hits
- … out of the meaning of heterostyled flowers. The results of crossing such flowers in an illegitimate …
Survival of the fittest: the trouble with terminology Part II
Summary
The most forceful and persistent critic of the term ‘natural selection’ was the co-discoverer of the process itself, Alfred Russel Wallace. Wallace seized on Herbert Spencer’s term ‘survival of the fittest’, explicitly introduced as an alternative way of…
Matches: 1 hits
- … his own copy of the first edition of Origin neatly crossing through every occurrence of ‘natural …
New material added to the American edition of Origin
Summary
A ‘revised and augmented’ American edition of Origin came on the market in July 1860, and was the only authorised edition available in the US until 1873. It incorporated many of the changes Darwin made to the second English edition, but still contained…
Matches: 1 hits
- … to the action of external conditions, something to the crossing of already existing forms, and much …
Darwin in letters, 1867: A civilised dispute
Summary
Charles Darwin’s major achievement in 1867 was the completion of his large work, The variation of animals and plants under domestication (Variation). The importance of Darwin’s network of correspondents becomes vividly apparent in his work on expression in…
Matches: 3 hits
- … or the Principles of Variation, Inheritance, Reversion, Crossing, Interbreeding, and Selection under …
- … on dimorphism and trimorphism and reported on a series of crossing experiments with orchids. Darwin …
- … [1867] ). Darwin was also interested in experiments crossing different species of orchids …
Darwin and Down
Summary
Charles and Emma Darwin, with their first two children, settled at Down House in the village of Down (later ‘Downe’) in Kent, as a young family in 1842. The house came with eighteen acres of land, and a fifteen acre meadow. The village combined the…
Matches: 1 hits
- … to study fertilisation (in particular the effects of crossing and of self-fertilisation); …
Darwin in letters, 1863: Quarrels at home, honours abroad
Summary
At the start of 1863, Charles Darwin was actively working on the manuscript of The variation of animals and plants under domestication, anticipating with excitement the construction of a hothouse to accommodate his increasingly varied botanical experiments…
Matches: 5 hits
- … Correspondence vol. 10, Appendix VI). In addition to crossing varieties of Primula in 1863, he …
- … the two men discussed a multitude of botanical subjects, the crossing experiments that Scott had …
- … and he continued to observe individuals of the same species crossing with one another in a variety …
- … particularly when he was working on the chapter he called ‘Crossing & Sterility’ (see …
- … discussions, completing three sections, on inheritance, crossing and sterility, and selection, by …
Darwin on childhood
Summary
On his engagement to his cousin, Emma Wedgwood, in 1838, Darwin wrote down his recollections of his early childhood. Life. Written August–– 1838 My earliest recollection, the date of which I can approximately tell, and which must have been before…
Matches: 1 hits
- … effect, on my memory.–– I remember, when going there crossing in the carriage a broad ford, & …
Darwin in letters, 1862: A multiplicity of experiments
Summary
1862 was a particularly productive year for Darwin. This was not only the case in his published output (two botanical papers and a book on the pollination mechanisms of orchids), but more particularly in the extent and breadth of the botanical experiments…
Fake Darwin: myths and misconceptions
Summary
Many myths have persisted about Darwin's life and work. Here are a few of the more pervasive ones, with full debunking below...
Matches: 1 hits
- … Many myths have persisted about Darwin's life and work. Here are a few of the more pervasive ones, …
Origin is 160; Darwin's 1875 letters now online
Summary
To mark the 160th anniversary of the publication of Origin of species, the full transcripts and footnotes of nearly 650 letters to and from Charles Darwin in 1875 are published online for the first time. You can read about Darwin's life in 1875…
Matches: 1 hits
- … fertilisation , summing up many years of experiments on crossing plants. I wd gladly …
Darwin’s earthquakes
Summary
Darwin experienced his first earthquake in 1834, but it was a few months later that he was really confronted with their power. Travelling north along the coast of Chile, Darwin and Robert FitzRoy, captain of HMS Beagle, were confronted with a series of…
Matches: 1 hits
- … he collected. Travelling on from South America and crossing back half way round the world, …
