To John Traherne Moggridge 19 June [1864]1
Down Bromley
June 19
Dear Sir
I am much obliged for your most interesting letter with the beautiful drawings.2 I have never received any account with so many new facts in so small a compass.
I should be very much obliged if you would inform me whether the cells into which you saw the bee insert its proboscis (in the labellum of O. longibractiata) were closed or open.3 I ask because I now know positively that bees do perforate the labellum of various orchids.4
Have you a dried specimen? for by soaking and cutting off a slice one could see. The convergence of the pollinia is quite a new and interesting fact.5
I have been almost more interested by what you say on the variability of the falling out of the pollen-masses in Ophrys scollopax than on any other point.6 Unless you can shew that the Cannes specimens resemble O. apifera in some characters I think your theory of crossing is rather too bold.7 I have shown though less clearly than you the movements of the pollinia of the Bee Ophrys.8 The seat of motion is never in the caudicle. Shall I return your beautiful drawings? Perhaps you intend to draw up for some Journal or for the Linn. Soc. a brief account of the new points which you have observed. I hope you will do so.9 I have much new matter on Orchids, but my health is so weak and I have so many other subjects on hand that I cannot at all tell when or ever I shall publish again.10
With sincere thanks for your excellent and most interesting letter, I remain, | Dear Sir, | Your’s very faithfully | Charles Darwin
Footnotes
Bibliography
Collected papers: The collected papers of Charles Darwin. Edited by Paul H. Barrett. 2 vols. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. 1977.
Crüger, Hermann. 1864. A few notes on the fecundation of orchids and their morphology. [Read 3 March 1864.] Journal of the Linnean Society (Botany) 8 (1865): 127–35.
‘Fertilization of orchids’: Notes on the fertilization of orchids. By Charles Darwin. Annals and Magazine of Natural History 4th ser. 4 (1869): 141–59. [Collected papers 2: 138–56.]
Moggridge, John Traherne. 1864. Observations on some orchids of the south of France. [Read 3 November 1864.] Journal of the Linnean Society (Botany) 8 (1865): 256–8.
Orchids 2d ed.: The various contrivances by which orchids are fertilised by insects. By Charles Darwin. 2d edition, revised. London: John Murray. 1877.
Orchids: On the various contrivances by which British and foreign orchids are fertilised by insects, and on the good effects of intercrossing. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1862.
Origin 4th ed.: On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. 4th edition, with additions and corrections. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1866.
Summary
Discusses fertilisation of flowers by bees. Thanks JTM for drawings.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-4540
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- John Traherne Moggridge
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 146: 372
- Physical description
- C 2pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 4540,” accessed on 20 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-4540.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 12