To W. D. Fox 14 August [1875]1
Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.
Aug. 14th
My dear Fox
You will remember telling me (& I have quoted the fact) that you had seen a dozen instances of white cats with blue eyes being deaf:2 now can you by an extraordinary chance remember the sex of any of them; as Mr Lawson Tait says it is only males which are thus affected.3
Ever yours | In Haste | C. Darwin
Footnotes
The year is established by the printed letterhead, which is of a sort that CD used between 1875 and 1882, and by the fact that CD cited Fox’s reply to this letter in Variation 2d ed. 2: 322 n. 24; CD was working on the second edition of Variation in the summer of 1875.
See Variation 2: 329.
Lawson Tait had published letters in the Pall Mall Gazette, 26 February 1868, p. 771, and in Scientific Opinion, 7 July 1869, p. 113, claiming that deafness was confined to male white cats (though not all male white cats were deaf), and that eye colour was a matter of indifference. There are lightly annotated clippings of the letters in DAR 164: 183a and 183b. Fox’s reply to this letter was published in Correspondence vol. 18, Supplement, with the date 16 August [1860?]; it should now be redated 16 August [1875].
Bibliography
Variation 2d ed.: The variation of animals and plants under domestication. By Charles Darwin. 2d edition. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1875.
Summary
Can WDF recall the sex of the deaf white cats.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-10121F
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- William Darwin Fox
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- Nate D. Sanders Auctions (dealer) (29 August 2019, lot 37)
- Physical description
- ALS 1p
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 10121F,” accessed on 19 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-10121F.xml
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