To John Lindley 28 December [1861]1
Down. | Bromley. | Kent. S.E.
Dec. 28th
My dear Lindley—
Very many thanks for information about the Acropera luteola, to which name I will attach a note.2
Also many thanks for the Gongora fulva— what a strange monstrous flower! It is, I am sorry to say, quite masculine in its nature & cannot be female of the A. Luteola. The pollen-masses &c are widely different from in Monacanthus viridis the female of Catasetum tridentatum. Of course, one can tell nothing safely from dry specimens, but I cannot help the suspicion that Gongora is also a male.3
I have been looking again very carefully at the placentæ of Acropera & I can see no escape from ranking that plant as a male.4
Yours very truly obliged | Charles Darwin
Footnotes
Bibliography
Orchids: On the various contrivances by which British and foreign orchids are fertilised by insects, and on the good effects of intercrossing. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1862.
Summary
Thanks JL for information about Acropera luteola.
Also thanks for the Gongora; cannot avoid the impression it is male.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-3353
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- John Lindley
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (Lindley letters, A–K: 200)
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 3353,” accessed on 28 March 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-3353.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 9