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Darwin Correspondence Project

To Rudolph Ludwig   [16 July 1877]1

Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.

Dear Sir,

I received only this morning your very kind letter of July 4th, together with your essay dedicated to me.2 I thank you sincerely for the great honour thus conferred on me. It is always very interesting to discover in the same ancient form characters which are now present in distinct species or subgroups; & Crocodilus Darwinii seems an excellent illustration of this remarkable fact.3

I remain, dear Sir | Yours faithfully & obliged | Charles Darwin

Footnotes

1
The date is established by a note on the letter, probably made by an archivist, recording the address to which it was sent, and the date, presumably from a postmark on the cover.
2
Ludwig’s letter has not been found. There is a copy of his Fossile Crocodiliden aus der Tertiärformation des Mainzer Beckens (Fossil Crocodilia from the Tertiary formation of the Mainz basin; Ludwig 1877) in the Darwin Pamphlet Collection–CUL.
3
Ludwig had named an alligator for CD: Alligator darwini (a synonym of Diplocynodon darwini).

Bibliography

Ludwig, Rudolph. 1877. Fossile Crocodiliden aus der Tertiärformation des Mainzer Beckens. Cassel: Verlag von Theodor Fischer.

Summary

Thanks RABL for his book on crocodiles [Fossile Crocodiliden (1877)].

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-11055
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
Rudolph August Birminhold Sebastian (Rudolph) Ludwig
Sent from
Down
Source of text
American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.517)
Physical description
LS 2pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 11055,” accessed on 26 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-11055.xml

letter

Darwin Correspondence Project
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