Summary

Asks GB for help in clearing up his problems about Leguminosae, in connection with his "wild bit of speculation on the crossing of plants" [see Natural selection, p. 71].

Summary

On crossing Aegilops.

Summary

Asks for return of page about pigeon crossing.

Summary

Does not think that publishing his letters as advertisement [for potato experiments] would help JT’s cause, so CD cannot give permission.

Regrets that he has neither the time nor health to undertake crossing experiments with JT’s specimens. Discusses crossing varieties.

Summary

Multiple creations.

Necessity for crossing in plants and animals: JDH to take up the subject; explains separate sexes in trees.

Continental extensions.

Summary

Questions JDH on separation of sexes in trees in New Zealand flora.

Summary

Suggests procedures for breeding experiments with hollyhocks. Recommends C. F. v. Gärtner [Bastarderzeugung (1849)]. [See also 3151]

Summary

Sends JDH part of MS for chapter 3 of Natural selection ["Possibility of all organic beings crossing"] to be corrected and returned.

JDH’s report of Podostemon flowering cleistogamously under water in Bengal.

[Copious revision by JDH.]

Summary

Discusses differences between Asa Gray’s view and his own on crossing. A common effect is the obliteration of incipient varieties. There is heavy evidence against new characters arising from crossing wild forms, "only intermediate races are then produced". Innate vital forces are somehow led to act differently as a result of direct effect of physical conditions. Astonished by JDH’s statement that every difference might have occurred without selection. CD agrees, but JDH’s manner of putting it astonished him. CD says, "think of each of a thousand seeds bringing forth its plant, and then each a thousand … I cannot even grapple with idea". Responds to JDH’s and Lyell’s feeling that he made too much of a deus ex machina out of natural selection. [Letter actually dated 20 Nov but is certainly after 3831.] [wrong field?]

Summary

Asks correspondent whether, when growing hollyhocks, he finds it necessary to space out the different varieties to prevent crossing and thus to obtain true seed [see Variation 2: 108].

Summary

Reports on an experiment in crossing potato varieties.

Summary

Illness of his wife.

Potato crossing experiments; believes he has increased yield considerably.

Summary

Answers D. Beaton’s criticism of Gärtner’s work, defending his results in crossing experiments and vindicating the memory of "one of the most laborious lovers of truth who ever lived".

Summary

Thanks Mr Beaton for his answer [to 3147].

Asks further questions on points raised in Beaton’s previous papers: whether crossing white and blue varieties of Anemone apennina produced many pale shades; whether the Mathiola incana and M. glabra which crossed freely were artificially or naturally crossed.

CD is delighted by Beaton’s assertion that "not a flower in a thousand is fertilised by its own immediate pollen".

Recounts his experiments with Leschenaultia formosa to show insect fertilisation.

Summary

Thanks for CD’s assistance and his advice on crossing.

Summary

Is obliged to Mr Bennett for information, the same relayed through Consul General Mr Crowe.

CD is interested in information that provides insight into the colour of the aboriginal horse and the possibility that the offspring of a cross between differently-coloured breeds revert to the colour of the aboriginal parent. He has examined crosses between pigeons for this purpose and would welcome any analogous facts resulting from crossing of distinct breeds.

Summary

Criticises chapter on good effect of crossing in Variation: (1) does not accept that inbreeding alone results in degeneracy; (2) good effects of crossing exaggerated; (3) denies deleterious effects of close marriage in humans.

Summary

Reports the decreased yield of pods resulting from excluding bees from the flowers of the kidney bean. Gives other observations suggesting the importance of bees in the fertilisation of papilionaceous flowers.

Cites cases of crosses between varieties of bean grown close together and requests observations from readers on the subject. States his belief "that is a law of nature that every organic being should occasionally be crossed with a different individual of the same species".

Summary

Congratulates CD on the Copley Medal.

Directs CD to his short memoir on crossing ["De l’hybridité", C. R. Hebd. Acad. Sci. 59 (1864): 837–45].

Summary

JS should be proud of his paper ["Nature of the fern-spore", Edinburgh New. Philos. J. 2d ser. 16 (1862): 209–27].

CD has just found that JS’s observations on the confluence of two sexes causing variability were independently confirmed by Huxley.

CD has always suspected a fundamental difference between buds and ovules.

Asks for examples of "bud-variation" or "sports".

Asks JS to test germination of pollen on rostellum of Laelia.

Offers JS money for experimental supplies, e.g., netting, to keep insects out of flowers.

Encloses an outline of crossing experiments with Lythraceae, Primula, Pelargonium, and others, which he feels would be valuable.

Note on melastomids.