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Darwin Correspondence Project

To H. W. Bates   12 February 1879

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

Feb— 12th. 79

Dear Bates

Enclosed is the certificate with 7 signatures, which I shd. think was ample, but I send it to you instead of direct to R. S., as you might like to get through some mutual friend Sir H. C. Rawlinson’s signature, whom I do not know.— If I were in your place I shd. append to your title “Ex Pres of Ent. Socy.”; but you are the best judge of this.—1 I think that you had better send the certificate, with note enclosed by a safe hand or registered.—

Yours very sincerely | Ch. Darwin

Footnotes

CD had agreed to propose Bates for fellowship of the Royal Society of London, and to circulate the necessary certificate; see letter to H. W. Bates, 26 January 1879. Henry Creswicke Rawlinson was not among the signatories on the certificate for election (Royal Society archives, GB 117 EC/1881/09); for a list of the ten signatories, see letter from H. W. Bates, 25 January 1879 and n. 1. Bates had been president of the Entomological Society of London in 1868, 1869, and 1878; his qualifications on the certificate included ‘ex-president’ of the society. He was elected FRS in 1881.

Summary

Encloses HWB’s Royal Society certificate with seven signatures, which CD thinks is ample.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-11871F
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
Henry Walter Bates
Sent from
Down
Source of text
Nate D. Sanders Auctions (dealer) (14 December 2017, lot 74)
Physical description
ALS 1p

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 11871F,” accessed on 20 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-11871F.xml

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