To J. D. Hooker 17 April [1865]
Down
Apr 17th
My dear Hooker,
We have been quite gay: J. Lubbock came here on Friday to lunch & was very pleasant:1 you will be glad to hear that he did not speak seriously of Mrs. L. & I suspect it is only case of family-wayishness.2 The more I think of it, the sorrier I am about parliament, though yet I do not at all like the thought of his being beaten.3 He says that he hears that his Book on Man will tell heavily against him.4 He will be Sir John, before very long, for poor old Sir J. has heart-mischief & is dropsical.5
On Sunday we had a call from M. Laugel, geologist & litterateur, a very agreeable, clever, & charming man: just returned from N. America & very enthusiastic for the Federals & very sanguine for their future in every respect.6
I will keep Bot. Zeitung for about one week—7 I have read N. Hist R. & guessed right to myself that Bentham wrote on Planchon;8 I liked the article; but as I had just read the essay there was not much new to me.—9 I have been very much struck by Thomson’s article: it seems to me quite remarkable for its judgment, force & clearness. It has interested me greatly.10 I had sometimes loosely speculated on what nomenclature would come to & concluded that it would be trinomial. What a name a plant will formally bear with the authors name after genus (as some recommend) & after species & subspecies! It really seems one of the greatest questions which can now be discussed for systematic Nat. Hist.11 How impartially Thomson adjusts the claims of “hair-splitters” & “lumpers”12 I sincerely hope he will pretty often write reviews or essays. It is an old subject of grief to me, formerly in geology, & of late in Zoolog. & Botany, that the very best men, (excepting those who have to write Principles & Elements &c)13 read so little & give up nearly their whole time to original work; I have often thought that science would progress more if there was more reading. How few read any long & laborious papers. The only use of publishing such seems to be as a proof that author has given time & labour to his work.
Well farewell my dear old fellow— let me hear before very long how Sir William is—14
Yours affect | C. Darwin
Footnotes
Bibliography
[Bentham, George.] 1865a. The ancient and modern floras of Montpellier. Natural History Review 5: 202–25.
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Dod’s parliamentary companion: The parliamentary pocket companion … compiled from official documents, and from the personal communications of members of both houses. Dod’s parliamentary companion. London: Whittaker, Treacher, & Arnot; Whittaker & Co. 1833–1914.
Grayson, Donald K. 1983. The establishment of human antiquity. New York: Academic Press.
Hutchinson, Horace Gordon. 1914. Life of Sir John Lubbock, Lord Avebury. 2 vols. London: Macmillan.
Jordan, Alexis. 1864. Diagnoses d’espèces nouvelles ou méconnues, pour servir de matériaux à une flore réformée de la France, et des contrées voisines. Paris: F. Savy.
Laugel, Antoine Auguste. 1860. Nouvelle théorie d’histoire naturelle. L’origine des espèces. Revue des deux mondes 2d ser. 26: 644–71.
Laugel, Antoine Auguste. 1865. Les Etats-Unis pendant la guerre. II. De l’Atlantique au Mississippi; l’Américain de l’ouest. Revue des Deux Mondes 56: 874–910.
Laugel, Antoine Auguste. 1866. Les Etats-Unis pendant la guerre (1861–1865). Paris: Germer Baillière.
Lyell, Charles. 1865. Elements of geology, or the ancient changes of the earth and its inhabitants as illustrated by geological monuments. 6th edition, revised. London: John Murray.
Lyell, Charles. 1867–8. Principles of geology or the modern changes of the earth and its inhabitants considered as illustrative of geology. 10th edition. 2 vols. London: John Murray.
McOuat, Gordon R. 1996. Species, rules and meaning: the politics of language and the ends of definitions in nineteenth century natural history. Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science 27: 473–519.
Mayr, Ernst. 1942. Systematics and the origin of species from the viewpoint of a zoologist. New York: Columbia University Press.
Origin: On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1859.
Stace, Clive Anthony. 1980. Plant taxonomy and biosystematics. London: Edward Arnold.
Stevens, Peter F. 1994. The development of biological systematics: Antoine-Laurent de Jussieu, nature, and the natural system. New York: Columbia University Press.
Stresemann, Erwin. 1975. Ornithology: from Aristotle to the present. Translated by Hans J. and Cathleen Epstein. Edited by G. William Cottrell. With foreword and epilogue by Ernst Mayr. Cambridge, Mass., and London: Harvard University Press.
[Thomson, Thomas.] 1865. Species and subspecies. Natural History Review 5: 226–42.
Summary
On Lubbock’s plans.
Visited by Antoine Auguste Laugel.
Guessed right on Bentham’s "Planchon".
Much struck by Thomson’s article on nomenclature [see 4812]; importance of this subject.
Sorry best scientists read so little; few read any long papers.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-4814
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Joseph Dalton Hooker
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 115: 265
- Physical description
- ALS 6pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 4814,” accessed on 29 September 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-4814.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 13