To Hugh Falconer [25–6 August 1863]1
Down
thank you for telling me about the pliocene mammal,2 which is very remarkable; but has not Owen stated that the pliocene badger is identical with the recent?3 Such a case does indeed well show the stupendous duration of the same form. I have not heard of Suess’ pamphet,4 and should much like to learn the title, if it can be procured; but I am on different subjects just at present. I should rather like to see it rendered highly probable that the process of formation of a new species was short compared to its duration; that is if the process was allowed to be slow and long: the idea is new to me.— Heer’s view that new species are suddenly formed like monsters, I feel a conviction from many reasons is false.—5 Whenever I come to London I have several little things to ask about; but when that will be I do not know. I have had a bad summer with much sickness of late, and we are all going to Malvern for a month, and start in a week’s time.6 I have managed to do this summer a fair share of work and have been greatly interested by the spontaneous movements and irritability of tendrils and twining plants; but only a little of my work is new.—7 Do you remember telling me that I ought to study phyllotaxy;8 well I have often wished you at the bottom of the sea; for I could not resist, and I muddled my brains with diagrams etc. and specimens and made out, as might have been expected, nothing. Those angles are a most wonderful problem and I wish I could see someone give a rational explanation of them.9
I am tired, so good night.
My dear Friend, | Yours very Sincerely. | Ch. Darwin.
Footnotes
Bibliography
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Heer, Oswald. 1860. Untersuchungen über das Klima und die Vegetationsverhältnisse des Tertiärlandes. Winterthur, Switzerland: Anstalt von Wurster.
LL: The life and letters of Charles Darwin, including an autobiographical chapter. Edited by Francis Darwin. 3 vols. London: John Murray. 1887–8.
Marginalia: Charles Darwin’s marginalia. Edited by Mario A. Di Gregorio with the assistance of Nicholas W. Gill. Vol. 1. New York and London: Garland Publishing. 1990.
Suess, Eduard. 1863. Über die Verschiedenheit und die Aufeinanderfolge der tertiären Landfaunen in der Niederung von Wien. Sitzungsberichte der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Mathematisch-Naturwissenschaftliche Classe 47 (pt 1): 306–31.
Summary
Thanks for information about Pliocene mammal. Interested in relating process of formation to duration of the species. Oswald Heer’s view that species suddenly formed surely false.
Bad summer with much sickness. Going to Malvern [for water-cure] for a month.
Muddled over phyllotaxy and made out nothing.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-4277
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Hugh Falconer
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 144: 32
- Physical description
- C 4pp inc
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 4277,” accessed on 9 November 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-4277.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 11