To J. D. Hooker 9 January [1867]
Down.
Jan 9th
My dear Hooker
I like the first part of your paper in Gard. Chronicle to an extraordinary degree;1 you never, in my opinion, wrote anything better. You ask for all, even minute, criticisms.—2 In 1st. column, you speak of no Alpine plants, & no replacement by zones, which will strike everyone with astonishment who has read Humboldt & Webb on zones on Teneriffe: : do you not mean boreal or Arctic plants?3 In 3d. column you speak as if savages had generally viewed the endemic plants of the Atlantic Islands, now, as you well know, the Canaries alone of all the Archs. were inhabited.4 In 3d. column have you really materials to speak of confirming the proportion of winged & wingless insects on Islands?—5
Your comparison of plants of Madeira with islets of Grt. Britain is admirable.—6
I must just allude to one of your last notes with very curious case of proportion of annuals in N. Zealand.7 Are annuals adapted for short seasons, as in Arctic regions, or Tropical countries with dry season, or for periodically disturbed & cultivated ground? You speak of Evergreen vegetation as leading to few or confined conditions; but is not evergreen vegetation connected with humid & equable climate? Does not a very humid climate almost imply (Tyndall) an equable one?8
I have never printed a word that I can remember about orchids, & papilionaceous plants being few in islands on account of rarity of insects:9 & I remember you screamed at me when I suggested this apropos to Papilionaceæ in N. Zealand, & to the statement about clover not seeding there till the Hive Bee was introduced, as I stated in my paper in Gard. Chronicle.—10
I have been these last few days vexed & annoyed to a foolish degree by hearing that my M.S. “on Dom. An. & Cult. Plants”, will make 2 vols, both bigger than the “Origin”. The volumes will have to be full-sized Octavo, & I have written to Murray to suggest details to be printed in small type.11 But I feel that the size is quite ludicrous in relation to the subject. I am ready to swear at myself & at every fool who writes a book.—
Yours affect | C. Darwin
Seed of any Plumbago.12
Footnotes
Bibliography
Autobiography: The autobiography of Charles Darwin 1809–1882. With original omissions restored. Edited with appendix and notes by Nora Barlow. London: Collins. 1958.
Collected papers: The collected papers of Charles Darwin. Edited by Paul H. Barrett. 2 vols. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. 1977.
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Hooker, Joseph Dalton. 1864–7. Handbook of the New Zealand flora: a systematic description of the native plants of New Zealand and the Chatham, Kermadec’s, Lord Auckland’s, Campbell’s, and MacQuarrie’s Islands. 2 vols. London: Lovell Reeve & Co.
Humboldt, Alexander von. 1814–29. Personal narrative of travels to the equinoctial regions of the New Continent, during the years 1799–1804. By Alexander de Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland. Translated into English by Helen Maria Williams. 7 vols. London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, & Brown; J. Murray; H. Colburn.
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.
Natural selection: Charles Darwin’s Natural selection: being the second part of his big species book written from 1856 to 1858. Edited by R. C. Stauffer. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1975.
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.
Variation: The variation of animals and plants under domestication. By Charles Darwin. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1868.
Williamson, M. 1984. Sir Joseph Hooker’s lecture on insular floras. Biological Journal of the Linnean Society 22: 55–77.
Wollaston, Thomas Vernon. 1854. Insecta Maderensia; being an account of the insects of the islands of the Madeiran group. London: John van Voorst.
Summary
Criticisms and comments on JDH’s "Insular floras" in Gardeners’ Chronicle [(1867): 6].
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-5353
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Joseph Dalton Hooker
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 94: 3–4
- Physical description
- ALS 4pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 5353,” accessed on 17 August 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-5353.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 15