From Francis Darwin 14 May 1881
May 14./81
My dear Father,
I got your proofs and sent off a post-card to say so. I will have a good go at them tomorrow, & I have done some this morning—1 I like de Bary very much & I can see that he hasn’t any of the touchiness of Sachs—2 I have got a very nice lodging at a bootmakers looking N over a little square called the Stephan-Platz; it is close to the river and only about 4 minutes from the laboratory
The laboratory seems to consist of a very long room with a row of tables where people are microscoping all day; then de Bary’s room which is not large & with a small table with a Hartnack3 on it & an awful mess of glasses watch glasses &c on it. Then comes my room and I have a separate door & key of my own. De Bary suggested the anatomy of roots as having some connection with the root work in the Movements of P. which he called “sehr interessant”.4 So I have begun with Equisetum roots; and he snipped a lot of little roots from a great plant in the laboratory which he knocked out of its pot for the purpose— I cut longitudinal sections and saw the things in Sachs like this;5
he said some of my prepns were “ganz gut so gar”, but the shine was taken off by his saying afterwards that it was “furchtbar leicht”.6 Today I have been cutting transverse sections of the same roots which is much more difficult; I havn’t shown him any of the good ones yet
I am partly disgusted to find that de Bary’s assistant Wortmann (whom I knew at Würzburg) has found circumnutation in the mycelium of some fungus which grows an awful pace, he will show it me, & then I can tell you more about it—7 I will send you a few addresses, & if you will send the Bramble papers off I shall be much obliged.8 I forget whether I told you that Stahl is now professor at Jena, this is a horrid bore for me, as he would have been society for me;9 being in a room by myself is rather bad for getting to know the people but I dare say I shall.
I think I should like Dandy, he might be turned out almost at once, and if I found I didn’t ride enough to make it worth while I suppose the Leith Hill vet would find a home for him—I will write to Aunt Caroline at once.10
Please thank Bessy & Mother for letters11 I am very glad poor Dubs12 cheered up so soon Your affec | F. D.
I have met Oscar Schmidt & given him herzlichen Gruss from you—13 I will tell you about him
Footnotes
Bibliography
Darwin, Francis. 1880c. The theory of the growth of cuttings; illustrated by observations on the bramble, Rubus fruticosus. [Read 16 December 1880.] Journal of the Linnean Society (Botany) 18 (1881): 406–19.
Darwin, Francis. 1881b. Ueber Circumnutation bei einem einzelligen Organe. Botanische Zeitung, 29 July 1881, pp. 473–80.
Earthworms: The formation of vegetable mould through the action of worms: with observations on their habits. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1881.
Freeman, Richard Broke. 1977. The works of Charles Darwin: an annotated bibliographical handlist. 2d edition. Folkestone, Kent: William Dawson & Sons. Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books, Shoe String Press.
Movement in plants: The power of movement in plants. By Charles Darwin. Assisted by Francis Darwin. London: John Murray. 1880.
Muth, Franz. 1926. Julius Wortmann. [Obituary.] Berichte der Deutschen Botanischen Gesellschaft 43 (1925–6): 112–42.
Sachs, Julius. 1875a. Text-book of botany: morphological and physiological. Translated and annotated by Alfred W. Bennett, assisted by W. T. Thiselton-Dyer. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Summary
News from the laboratory at Strasbourg; is working on Equisetum roots. Wortmann has found circumnutation in the mycelium of a fast-growing fungus. Please send papers (see 13155).
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-13155F
- From
- Francis Darwin
- To
- Charles Robert Darwin
- Source of text
- DAR 274.1: 70
- Physical description
- ALS
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 13155F,” accessed on 1 September 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-13155F.xml