To Charles Lyell 18 February [1854]
Summary
Comments on CL’s plan to visit Tenerife.
Discusses inclination of strata on islands and around mountains.
Personal affairs of several scientists.
Visit by Henslow.
Notes publication by Hooker [Himalayan journals (1854)].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
| Date: | 18 Feb [1854] |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.108) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1553 |
To Charles Lyell 26 April [1858]
Summary
Comments on letter from Georg Hartung to CL dealing with erratic boulders.
Discusses migration of plants and animals.
A letter from Thomas Thomson on heat endured by temperate plants.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
| Date: | 26 Apr [1858] |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.151) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2262 |
To W. B. Tegetmeier 1 March [1861]
Summary
Thanks for skulls
and information about Ferguson.
Is working on rabbits’ skeletons.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | William Bernhard Tegetmeier |
| Date: | 1 Mar [1861] |
| Classmark: | Archives of the New York Botanical Garden (Charles Finney Cox Collection) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3075 |
Matches: 3 hits
- … of a manual on poultry ( Ferguson 1854 ). See letter to W. B. Tegetmeier, 25 February [ …
- … letter to W. B. Tegetmeier, 25 February [1861] , n. 6. Tegetmeier was to be one of the judges of fowls and pigeons at the Preston poultry show, to be held on 6 and 7 March 1861 ( Cottage Gardener 25 (1861): 357). Delamer 1854 , …
- … 1854 as one of his sources and reproducing an illustration of the half- lop rabbit taken from this work ( Variation 1: 107–8). When CD was studying the formation of bees’ cells in 1858, Tegetmeier had recommended providing the bees with coloured wax to investigate their manner of cell construction. See Correspondence vol. 7, letter …
To G. H. Darwin 27–8 February [1881]
Summary
Describes lecture at Royal Institution by J. S. Burdon Sanderson on movement of plants and animals; JSBS’s preliminary part was so long that he never got to the plants.
Comments on the triumph of the ladies in the voting at Cambridge.
Mentions F. Galton’s visit to Down, a call on the Huxleys, and a visit with the Duke of Argyll.
Tells a story about the absent-mindedness of Burdon Sanderson.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | George Howard Darwin |
| Date: | 27–8 Feb [1881] |
| Classmark: | DAR 210.1: 103 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13068 |
From William Henry Harvey 3 January 1857
Summary
Sexes of algae.
| Author: | William Henry Harvey |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 3 Jan 1857 |
| Classmark: | DAR 166: 115 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2035 |
To J. S. Henslow 20 February [1854]
Summary
Honoured and gratified by the dedication [to CD] of Hooker’s book [Himalayan journals].
News of Lyell from Madeira.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | John Stevens Henslow |
| Date: | 20 Feb [1854] |
| Classmark: | California State Library, San Francisco, Sutro Library (Crocker collection: folder #11) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1554 |
From J. D. Hooker [26 December 1858]
Summary
JDH cannot abide CD’s connection of wide-ranging species and "highness". Australian flora contradicts this in many ways.
| Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | [26 Dec 1858] |
| Classmark: | DAR 100: 125–6 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2385 |
To John Higgins 5 October [1854]
Summary
Discusses lost investment opportunity.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | John Higgins |
| Date: | 5 Oct [1854] |
| Classmark: | Lincolnshire Archives (HIG/4/2/1/82) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1594 |
To G. R. Waterhouse 4 March [1855]
Summary
A page of [unspecified] text is missing from a parcel of material received from GRW.
CD "hopes and expects to live to see Carboniferous, & perhaps even Silurian, mammifers!"
Has several questions to ask whenever they meet.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | George Robert Waterhouse |
| Date: | 4 Mar [1855] |
| Classmark: | Natural History Museum, Library and Archives (Archives DF PAL/100/7/29) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1641 |
From Robert Hunt 24 July 1855
Summary
Informs CD which colours of glass accelerate germination, lignification, and floriation; advises CD on obtaining such glass and offers his help in any experiments.
| Author: | Robert Hunt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 24 July 1855 |
| Classmark: | DAR 261.11: 18 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1730 |
To Albany Hancock [31 March or 7 April 1850]
Summary
AH may keep CD’s MS as long as he likes.
Comments on various cirripede species. "I mean now to continue at Systematic Part till I have finished."
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Albany Hancock |
| Date: | [31 Mar or 7 Apr] 1850 |
| Classmark: | The New York Public Library. Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations. The Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature. |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1316 |
Matches: 2 hits
- … Cirripedia (1854): 267). Living Cirripedia (1851): 133. See also letter to J. J. S. …
- … letter to Albany Hancock, [26 January – March 1850] , in which CD stated he was sending to Hancock his specimens and notes on Mollusca. One of CD’s nudibranch molluscs is mentioned in Alder and Hancock 1845–55, pt 6, under the description of Thecacera . The geographical distribution is described in ibid. , pt 7, pp. 27–32. There is a copy of the work in the Darwin Library–CUL. A synonym for Balanus perforatus ( Living Cirripedia (1854): …
To Albany Hancock [26 January – March 1850]
Summary
Discusses mollusc specimens and related notes sent to AH. Thanks him for cirripede specimens. Discusses various cirripede species.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Albany Hancock |
| Date: | [26 Jan – Mar 1850] |
| Classmark: | Archives of the New York Botanical Garden (Charles Finney Cox Collection) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1311 |
To Francis Galton 28 May [1854]
Summary
Discusses how Fuegians and other primitive peoples light fires.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Francis Galton |
| Date: | 28 May [1854] |
| Classmark: | UCL Library Services, Special Collections (GALTON/1/1/9/5/7/2) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1881 |
Matches: 2 hits
- … 1854 is the most likely year for this letter as the information was probably requested by …
- … 1854 before the publication of Galton 1855 . A copy of Galton 1855 is in the Darwin Library–CUL; it is inscribed, ‘ Charles Darwin Esq r . With the best regards of the Author. ’ and contains annotations by CD. The book was sent to CD soon after publication (see letter …
To Jeffries Wyman 8 October [1865]
Summary
Experiments with string and elastic paper answered well.
Does JW know Ferdinand Cohn’s paper on contraction of stamens of certain Compositae [Edinburgh New Philos. J. n.s. 18 (1863): 190–4]?
Formerly made observations on movement in plants, but weak health has made it impossible to publish.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Jeffries Wyman |
| Date: | 8 Oct [1865] |
| Classmark: | Harvard Medical Library in the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine (Jeffries Wyman papers H MS c 12) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4912 |
To W. B. Tegetmeier 25 February [1861]
Summary
Would like to borrow WBT’s collection of fowls’ skulls.
Asks for WBT’s opinion of G. Ferguson, the author of a poultry book [Ferguson’s illustrated book of domestic poultry].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | William Bernhard Tegetmeier |
| Date: | 25 Feb [1861] |
| Classmark: | Archives of the New York Botanical Garden (Charles Finney Cox Collection) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3070 |
Matches: 4 hits
- … 1854 , p. 186. Tegetmeier apparently did investigate this point further. See letter to …
- … Ferguson 1854 ). The work had been recommended to CD by William A. Wooler (see letter …
- … letters from Edward Hewitt , 18 December 1857 and 22 December 1857 . A note written on the inside back cover of CD’s copy of Ferguson 1854 …
- … 1854 in the Darwin Library–CUL. CD had long been interested in collecting authenticated instances of successful crosses between pheasants and common fowl (see Natural selection , pp. 434–5). Tegetmeier had previously put CD in touch with a breeder who had made such crosses. See Correspondence vol. 6, letter …
To Edwin Lankester, Ray Society 4 March [1851]
Summary
Asks EL to request the Council [of the Ray Society] to permit him to have nine plates [for vol. 1 of Living Cirripedia] instead of eight (of which two were to be in colour) and a tenth plate if he pays for it himself.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Edwin Lankester; Ray Society |
| Date: | 4 Mar [1851] |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1395 |
To James Clark Ross 25 February [1848]
Summary
Thanks for sending cirripedes. Cannot make out the label, so can JCR tell him the bank and the depth. Hopes to keep the specimens for 6 or 8 weeks before returning them.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | James Clark Ross |
| Date: | 25 Feb [1848] |
| Classmark: | Scott Polar Research Institute (MS 1226/10) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1158A |
To J. D. Dana 6 December [1853]
Summary
Responds to JDD’s objections to his views on the three pairs of appendages in larvae of cirripedes. Reports observations which confirm his views.
Gives his confidential opinion of A. White, C. S. Bate, T. Bell, and W. Baird.
Interested in JDD’s observation that Crustacea are not most developed in the tropics. If JDD ever works it out either in number of species or rank, CD would be glad to have result.
Comments on article by Henri Milne-Edwards ["Crustacés", Ann. Sci. Nat. (Zool.) 18 (1852): 109–66].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | James Dwight Dana |
| Date: | 6 Dec [1853] |
| Classmark: | Yale University Library: Manuscripts and Archives (Dana Family Papers (MS 164) Series 1, Box 2, folder 43) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1542 |
Matches: 5 hits
- … see also letter to J. D. Dana, 8 May [1852] . Living Cirripedia (1854): 106–8 and nn. …
- … and Arts (see letter to J. D. Dana, 25 November [1852] ). Living Cirripedia (1854) was …
- … 1854): 106, 580. CD and Dana had earlier disagreed over the homologies of the two pairs of larval antenna. See Correspondence vol. 4, letter …
- … letter to Charles Lyell, [1 November 1849] ). He and Mary Lyell, together with Frances Joanna and Charles James Fox Bunbury , arrived in Madeira on 18 December. On 18 February 1854 …
- … letter to J. D. Dana, 27 September [1853] , CD wrote about John Lubbock : ‘if you can ever give him a little encouragement it would really be a good service, for he … may do good work in Natural History. ’ In Living Cirripedia (1854): …
| letter | (519) |
| people | (14) |
| bibliography | (1) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (172) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (61) |
| Lyell, Charles | (20) |
| Hancock, Albany | (16) |
| Huxley, T. H. | (15) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (510) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (112) |
| Lyell, Charles | (27) |
| Hancock, Albany | (17) |
| Huxley, T. H. | (15) |
| 1838 | (1) |
| 1844 | (2) |
| 1845 | (2) |
| 1846 | (5) |
| 1847 | (3) |
| 1848 | (14) |
| 1849 | (15) |
| 1850 | (23) |
| 1851 | (23) |
| 1852 | (13) |
| 1853 | (30) |
| 1854 | (56) |
| 1855 | (53) |
| 1856 | (36) |
| 1857 | (15) |
| 1858 | (16) |
| 1859 | (12) |
| 1860 | (19) |
| 1861 | (20) |
| 1862 | (21) |
| 1863 | (22) |
| 1864 | (20) |
| 1865 | (15) |
| 1866 | (10) |
| 1867 | (10) |
| 1868 | (13) |
| 1869 | (4) |
| 1870 | (5) |
| 1871 | (5) |
| 1872 | (5) |
| 1873 | (5) |
| 1874 | (4) |
| 1875 | (6) |
| 1876 | (4) |
| 1877 | (5) |
| 1878 | (3) |
| 1879 | (1) |
| 1880 | (1) |
| 1881 | (2) |
Darwin in letters, 1851-1855: Death of a daughter
Summary
The letters from these years reveal the main preoccupations of Darwin’s life with a new intensity. The period opens with a family tragedy in the death of Darwin’s oldest and favourite daughter, Anne, and it shows how, weary and mourning his dead child,…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The letters from these years reveal the main preoccupations of Darwin’s life with a new intensity. …
Scientific Practice
Summary
Specialism|Experiment|Microscopes|Collecting|Theory Letter writing is often seen as a part of scientific communication, rather than as integral to knowledge making. This section shows how correspondence could help to shape the practice of science, from…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Specialism | Experiment | Microscopes | Collecting | Theory Letter writing …
Darwin’s reading notebooks
Summary
In April 1838, Darwin began recording the titles of books he had read and the books he wished to read in Notebook C (Notebooks, pp. 319–28). In 1839, these lists were copied and continued in separate notebooks. The first of these reading notebooks (DAR 119…
Matches: 1 hits
- … In April 1838, Darwin began recording the titles of books he had read and the books he wished to …
Darwin and the Church
Summary
The story of Charles Darwin’s involvement with the church is one that is told far too rarely. It shows another side of the man who is more often remembered for his personal struggles with faith, or for his role in large-scale controversies over the…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The story of Charles Darwin’s involvement with the church is one that is told far too rarely. It …
Living and fossil cirripedia
Summary
Darwin published four volumes on barnacles, the crustacean sub-class Cirripedia, between 1851 and 1854, two on living species and two on fossil species. Written for a specialist audience, they are among the most challenging and least read of Darwin’s works…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin published four volumes on the crustacean sub-class Cirripedia between 1851 and 1854, two on …
Darwin in letters, 1847-1850: Microscopes and barnacles
Summary
Darwin's study of barnacles, begun in 1844, took him eight years to complete. The correspondence reveals how his interest in a species found during the Beagle voyage developed into an investigation of the comparative anatomy of other cirripedes and…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Species theory In November 1845, Charles Darwin wrote to his friend and confidant Joseph …
Darwin’s study of the Cirripedia
Summary
Darwin’s work on barnacles, conducted between 1846 and 1854, has long posed problems for historians. Coming between his transmutation notebooks and the Origin of species, it has frequently been interpreted as a digression from Darwin’s species work. Yet…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin’s work on barnacles, conducted between 1846 and 1854, has long posed problems for …
3.2 Maull and Polyblank photo 1
Summary
< Back to Introduction The rise of professional photographic studios in the mid nineteenth century was a key factor in the shaping of Darwinian iconography, but Darwin’s relationship with these firms was from the start a cautious and sometimes a…
Matches: 1 hits
- … < Back to Introduction The rise of professional photographic studios in the mid …
John Murray
Summary
Darwin's most famous book On the origin of species by means of natural selection (Origin) was published on 22 November 1859. The publisher was John Murray, who specialised in non-fiction, particularly politics, travel and science, and had published…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin's most famous book On the origin of species by means of natural selection (Origin) was …
Before Origin: the ‘big book’
Summary
Darwin began ‘sorting notes for Species Theory’ on 9 September 1854, the very day he concluded his eight-year study of barnacles (Darwin's Journal). He had long considered the question of species. In 1842, he outlined a theory of transmutation in a…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin began ‘sorting notes for Species Theory’ on 9 September 1854, the very day he concluded his …
Scientific Networks
Summary
Friendship|Mentors|Class|Gender In its broadest sense, a scientific network is a set of connections between people, places, and things that channel the communication of knowledge, and that substantially determine both its intellectual form and content,…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Friendship | Mentors | Class | Gender In its broadest sense, a scientific …
Editorial policy and practice
Summary
Full texts are added to this site four years after the letter is published in the print edition of the Correspondence. Transcriptions are made from the original or a facsimile where these are available. Where they are not, texts are taken from the best…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Full texts are added to this site four years after the letter is published in the print edition of …
Joseph Simms
Summary
The American doctor and author of works on physiognomy Joseph Simms wrote to Darwin on 14 September 1874, while he was staying in London. He enclosed a copy of his book Nature’s revelations of character (Simms 1873). He hoped it might 'prove…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The American doctor and author of works on physiognomy Joseph Simms wrote to Darwin on 14 …
Darwin’s observations on his children
Summary
Charles Darwin’s observations on the development of his children, began the research that culminated in his book The Expression of the emotions in man and animals, published in 1872, and his article ‘A biographical sketch of an infant’, published in Mind…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Charles Darwin’s observations on the development of his children,[1] began the research that …
Barnacles
Summary
Sources|Discussion Questions|Experiment Darwin and barnacles Darwin’s interest in Cirripedia, a class of marine arthropods, was first piqued by the discovery of an odd burrowing barnacle, which he later named “Mr. Arthrobalanus," while he was…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Sources | Discussion Questions | Experiment Darwin and barnacles …
Charles Darwin’s letters: a selection 1825-1859
Summary
The letters in this volume span the years from 1825, when Darwin was a student at the University of Edinburgh, to the end of 1859, when the Origin of Species was published. The early letters portray Darwin as a lively sixteen-year-old medical student. Two…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The letters in this volume span the years from 1825, when Darwin was a student at the University …
3.3 Maull and Polyblank photo 2
Summary
< Back to Introduction Despite the difficulties that arose in relation to Maull and Polyblank’s first photograph of Darwin, another one was produced, this time showing him in three-quarter view. It was evidently not taken at the same session as the…
Matches: 1 hits
- … < Back to Introduction Despite the difficulties that arose in relation to Maull and …
Science, Work and Manliness
Summary
Discussion Questions|Letters In 1859, popular didactic writer William Landels published the first edition of what proved to be one of his best-selling works, How Men Are Made. "It is by work, work, work" he told his middle class audience, …
Matches: 1 hits
- … Discussion Questions | Letters In 1859, popular didactic writer William Landels …
Alfred Russel Wallace
Summary
Wallace was a leading Victorian naturalist, with wide-ranging interests from biogeography and evolutionary theory to spiritualism and politics. He was born in 1823 in Usk, a small town in south-east Wales, and attended a grammar school in Hertford. At the…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Wallace was a leading Victorian naturalist, with wide-ranging interests from biogeography and …
Thomas Henry Huxley
Summary
Dubbed “Darwin’s bulldog” for his combative role in controversies over evolution, Huxley was a leading Victorian zoologist, science popularizer, and education reformer. He was born in Ealing, a small village west of London, in 1825. With only two years of…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Dubbed “Darwin’s bulldog” for his combative role in controversies over evolution, Huxley was a …
