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From J. E. Gray   13 April 1866

BM

13 April 1866

My Dear Darwin

I have sent you a Botanical work which I fear is not much in your way, except as proving what good workers there were formerly, and it also contains some curious instances of the introduction of some garden plants1

Like “Leach mollusca it is publish in memoriam of person kind to me when I was a lad working to support my self2 & some dependent on me who, I am glad to say have all done well3

Did you see the account in the Annals [extracted] from the Boston Journal of a Whale (Beluga) that was harnessed onto a carriage but the more [curious] part of the paper is that this Beluga was not so tame as the Tursio 4

I hear there is a Porpoise at Hastings that has been kept in a pond a month   [Couch] gave the account of one that live in a Pond (of Salt Water?) for much longer5

My Catalogue of Whales is out but our printers only gave me one copy6

With kindest Regards to Mrs Darwin7 & yourself | Ever yours sincerely | J E Gray

Footnotes

1
The reference is to The genera of plants by Richard Anthony Salisbury (Salisbury 1866). The work was based on a manuscript, unfinished at the time of Salisbury’s death in 1829, that Gray had obtained in 1864 (see Gunther 1975, pp. 42, 157).
2
Gray refers to Molluscorum Britanniæ synopsis by William Elford Leach (Leach 1852). Gray had arranged for the book’s publication, having obtained printed proofs and manuscript pages of the work, which had been interrupted when the author fell ill in 1820. In his preface, Gray expressed his debt to the author for having afforded him the opportunity to study zoology (Leach 1852, p. vii). Similarly, Gray noted the kindness he had received from Salisbury in his preface to Salisbury 1866, p. iv. On Gray’s early career and his relations with Salisbury and Leach, see Gunther 1975, pp. 19–30.
3
Gray was the second of five children. He partly supported his parents and younger siblings from an early age. His younger brother, George Robert, became assistant keeper at the British Museum. The youngest of his sisters, Charlotte Frances, married Samuel Birch, who became keeper of oriental antiquities at the British Museum. See Gunther 1975, pp. 19, 21–23, 28.
4
The note ‘Domesticated whales’ appeared in Annals and Magazine of Natural History, April 1866, p. 312. It described a ‘White Whale’ that ‘was sufficiently well trained during the time he was in confinement to allow himself to be harnessed to a car, in which he drew a young lady around the tank’. The notice was extracted from the article ‘Description of a “White Fish”, or “White Whale,” (Beluga borealis Lesson)’ in the Boston Journal of Natural History (1863): 603–12 (Wyman 1863). Beluga borealis is a synonym of Delphinapterus leucas, the beluga. Tursio is now known as Tursiops, the genus of bottle-nosed dolphins.
5
Gray may refer to the ichthyologist Jonathan Couch. A frequent contributor to natural history journals, he collected extensive materials for a book on the British Cetacea (the order includes porpoises), which was never completed (Couch 1871, p. 17). The account of the porpoise has not been found.
6
Gray refers to Catalogue of seals and whales in the British Museum (J. E. Gray 1866).

Bibliography

Couch, Jonathan. 1871. The history of Polperro, a fishing town on the south coast of Cornwall. Truro: W. Lake.

Leach, William Elford. 1852. Molluscorum Britanniæ synopsis. A synopsis of the Mollusca of Great Britain, arranged according to their natural affinities and anatomical structure. London: John Van Voorst.

Salisbury, Richard Anthony. 1866. The genera of plants. London: Van Voorst.

Wyman, Jeffries. 1863. Description of a ‘White Fish,’ or ‘White Whale,’ (Beluga borealis Lesson). Boston Journal of Natural History 7: 603–12.

Summary

Tameness of whales and porpoises.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-5056
From
John Edward Gray
To
Charles Robert Darwin
Sent from
British Museum
Source of text
DAR 165: 211
Physical description
ALS 4pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 5056,” accessed on 19 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-5056.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 14

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