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From Charles Cardale Babington   18 May 1864

Cambridge

18 May 1864

Dear Darwin,

It was only within the last few days that I heard that your health had been so bad recently and it is now a great pleasure to learn you are materially better.1

I do not think that Lythrum hyssopifolium2 is come into flower, but will see the next time that I go to the Botanic Garden.3 We had it there last year & I hope that it has sprung from selfsown seeds again; but do not know as yet. If we have it I will take care that flowers are sent as you wish. I do not know where to get a wild specimen with the least certainty: but it is the same as wild in the garden.

I am just about finishing my short course of lectures.4 The class has been a good one, from 35–45 in attendance and attentive.

Yours very truly | Charles C. Babington

Footnotes

1
No letter to Babington concerning CD’s health or Lythrum hyssopifolium has been found (see n. 2, below).
2
CD was writing a paper on dimorphism in Lythrum salicaria, and was evidently seeking specimens of other species in the genus so that he could include observations on them in his article. See also letter to J. D. Hooker, [15 May 1864], letter from C. C. Babington, 21 May 1864, and letter to H. C. Watson, 28 May [1864]. For a discussion of CD’s experiments with Lythrum, see letter to J. D. Hooker, 13 April [1864] and n. 7, and Appendix III.
3
Babington was professor of botany at Cambridge University and keeper of the University Herbarium (DNB); his duties would have included assisting in the management of the University Botanic Garden.
4
Babington gave an annual course of lectures during the Easter term that included field excursions (see A. M. Babington ed. 1897). For a discussion of Babington’s teaching at Cambridge, see Walters 1981, pp. 67, 70, Brooke 1993, p. 161, and Allen 1999, pp. 5–6, 9.

Bibliography

Allen, David Elliston. 1999. C. C. Babington, Cambridge botany and the taxonomy of British flowering plants. Nature in Cambridgeshire 41: 2–11.

Brooke, Christopher N. L. 1993. A history of the University of Cambridge, 1870–1990. Vol. 4 of A history of the University of Cambridge, general editor Christopher N. L. Brooke. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

DNB: Dictionary of national biography. Edited by Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee. 63 vols. and 2 supplements (6 vols.). London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1912. Dictionary of national biography 1912–90. Edited by H. W. C. Davis et al. 9 vols. London: Oxford University Press. 1927–96.

Walters, Stuart Max. 1981. The shaping of Cambridge botany. A short history of whole-plant botany in Cambridge from the time of Ray into the present century. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Summary

Glad to hear CD well again.

Will send Lythrum hyssopifolium flowers from Botanic Garden if they are in bloom; does not know where to find wild specimen, but thinks they are same as garden type.

Is finishing his course of lectures, which was attended by 35–45 people.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-4499
From
Charles Cardale Babington
To
Charles Robert Darwin
Sent from
Cambridge
Source of text
DAR 160: 6
Physical description
ALS 3pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 4499,” accessed on 19 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-4499.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 12

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