To J. J. Weir 4 April [1868]
Down. | Bromley. | Kent. S.E.
April 4th
My dear Sir
I read over your last ten(!) letters this morning & made an index of their contents for easy reference; & what a mine of wealth you have bestowed on me.—1 I am glad you will publish yourself on gay-coloured caterpillars & Birds: it seems to me much the best plan: therefore I will not forward your letter to Mr Wallace.2
I was much in Zoolog. Gardens during my month in London & picked up what scraps of knowledge I could: without my having mentioned your most interesting observations on the display of the Fringillidæ, Mr. Bartlett told me how the Gold Pheasant erects his collar & turns from side to side displaying it to the hen.3 He has offered to give me notes on the display of all Gallinaceæ with which he is acquainted; but he is so busy a man that I rather doubt whether he will ever do so.—4
I received about a week ago a remarkably kind letter from your Brother; & I am sorry to hear that he suffers much in health: he gave me some fine facts about a Dun Hen Carrier which would never pair with a Bird of any other colour. He told me, also, of some one at Lewes who paints his dog! & will enquire about it.5
By the way Mr Trimen tells me that as a Boy he used to paint Butterflies, & that they long haunted the same place; but he made no further observations on them.6
As far as colour is concerned, I see I shall have to trust to mere inference from the males displaying their plumage & other analogous facts.— I shall get no direct evidence of the preference of the hens.—
Mr Hewitt of Birmingham tells me that the common hen prefers a salacious cock, but is quite indifferent to colour.—7
Will you consider & kindly give me your opinion on the two following points. Do very vigorous & well nourished hens receive the male earlier in the Spring than weaker or poorer hens? I suppose that they do.—
Secondly, do you suppose that the birds which pair first in the season have any advantage in rearing numerous & healthy offspring over those which pair later in the season?
With respect to the mysterious cases, of which you have given me so many in addition to those previously collected, of when one bird of a pair is shot, another immediately supplying its place, I was drawing to the conclusion that there must be in each district several unpaired birds; yet this seems very improbable.— You allude, also, to the unknown causes which keep down the numbers of Birds; & often & often have I marvelled over this subject with respect to many animals.8
With sincere thanks | My dear Sir | Yours very faithfully | Charles Darwin
Footnotes
Bibliography
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Descent: The descent of man, and selection in relation to sex. By Charles Darwin. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1871.
Weir, John Jenner. 1869. On insects and insectivorous birds; and especially on the relation between the colour and the edibility of Lepidoptera and their larvae. [Read 1 March 1869.] Transactions of the Entomological Society of London (1869): 21–6.
Summary
CD thanks JJW for the mine of information his last "ten!" letters contain. Comments on sexual display of pheasants and colour preferences of pigeons.
Asks about hens that pair earliest in spring and about possible existence of unpaired birds.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-6090
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- John Jenner Weir
- Sent from
- Down
- Postmark
- AP 5 68
- Source of text
- American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.)
- Physical description
- ALS 8pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 6090,” accessed on 28 March 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-6090.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 16