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Darwin Correspondence Project

To Hermann Settegast   29 September 1870

Down. | Beckenham | Kent. S.E.

Sep 29. 1870

Dear Sir

I am very much obliged for your kind letter & present of your beautiful volume. Your work is not new to me, for I heard it so highly spoken of that I procured a copy of the first edition.1 It was a great gratification to me to find a man who had long studied with a philosophical spirit our domesticated animals, & who was highly competent to judge, agreeing to a large extent with my views. I regretted much that I had not known your work when I published my last volumes.2

I am surprized & pleased to hear that science is not quite forgotten under the present exciting state of affairs. Every one whom I know in England is an enthusiastic wisher for the full & complete success of Germany—3

With my best thanks & sincere respect I remain | dear Sir | yours faithfully | ⁠⟨⁠Charles Darwin⁠⟩⁠4

P.S. I will give one of my two copies of your work to some public scientific library in London

Footnotes

1
The reference is to Die Thierzucht (Settegast 1868). CD’s lightly annotated copy is in the Darwin Library–Down (see Marginalia 1: 754). CD had ordered a copy in 1868 (see Correspondence vol. 16, letter from Williams & Norgate, 2 June 1868). A second edition was published in 1869.
2
CD refers to Variation. He cited Settegast 1868 in Variation 2d ed., 2: 331 n. 41.
3
CD alludes to the Franco-Prussian war.
4
The signature has been excised.

Bibliography

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

Marginalia: Charles Darwin’s marginalia. Edited by Mario A. Di Gregorio with the assistance of Nicholas W. Gill. Vol. 1. New York and London: Garland Publishing. 1990.

Settegast, Hermann Gustav. 1868. Die Thierzucht. Breslau: Wilh. Gottl. Korn.

Variation 2d ed.: The variation of animals and plants under domestication. By Charles Darwin. 2d edition. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1875.

Summary

Thanks HS for a copy of his book [? Die Thierzucht (1868)].

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-7330
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
Hermann Gustav (Hermann) Settegast
Sent from
Down
Source of text
Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin – Preußischer Kulturbesitz (Autogr. I/101, Bl. 1–2)
Physical description
L 3pp damaged

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 7330,” accessed on 26 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-7330.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 18

letter

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