skip to content

Darwin Correspondence Project

To John Murray   9 April [1860]

Down Bromley Kent

Ap. 9th

My dear Sir

Will you be so good as to send a copy of the Origin addressed as follows, marked from Author

Prof. Kölliker1 &c &c care of Prof. Huxley Museum of Geology Jermyn Str—

Have you seen the Edinburgh Review?2 I am thrashed in every possible way to the full content of my bitterest opposers. The article is very venemous, & is manifestly by Owen. I wish for auld lang syne’s sake he had been a little less bitter.—

My dear Sir | Yours very sincerely | C. Darwin

Sedgwick has been very fierce in the Spectator; but his blows are fair & open.3 There is some misrepresentation, but no doubt unintentional. Upon the whole I have as yet escaped pretty well.—

Please also to send a copy of Origin to Messrs Williams & Norgate, with enclosed memorandum.—4 Marking copy “from Author”

Footnotes

CD had asked Thomas Henry Huxley to write to Rudolf Albert von Kölliker inquiring about a possible German translation of Origin. See Correspondence vol. 7, letter to T. H. Huxley, [9 December 1859], and this vol., letter to T. H. Huxley, 4 February [1860].
[R. Owen] 1860a.
The memorandum has not been found, but was a request to the booksellers and publishers Williams and Norgate to send a presentation copy of Origin to Justus von Liebig (see letter to Williams & Norgate, 10 April [1860]. See Correspondence vol. 7, letter to J. D. Hooker, [27 October or 3 November 1859].

Bibliography

Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.

Origin: On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1859.

[Sedgwick, Adam.] 1860. Objections to Mr Darwin’s theory of the origin of species. Spectator, 24 March 1860, pp. 285–6. [Reprinted with revisions in ibid., 7 April 1860, pp. 334–5.]

Summary

Asks that a copy of Origin [1860] be sent to R. A. von Kölliker.

A venomous review "manifestly by Owen" has appeared in Edinburgh Review.

Sedgwick has been fierce in Spectator, but fair and open.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-2752
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
John Murray
Sent from
Down
Source of text
National Library of Scotland (John Murray Archive) (Ms.42152 ff.90–91)
Physical description
ALS 3pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 2752,” accessed on 28 March 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-2752.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 8

letter