Summary

Discusses transport of fish to Lake Constance by flooding.

Summary

Has been writing a notice of H. W. Bates’s "capital book" [Naturalist on the river Amazons (1863)].

P. M. Duncan’s coral paper [J. Geol. Soc. Lond. 29 (1863): 406–58] strengthens SPW’s belief in the general diffusion of marine forms westward in the course of time.

Summary

Cirripede fossil specimens returned.

Summary

Thanks SPW for his history of Aptychus, which makes A. D. d’Orbigny’s view [that it is a cirripede] improbable. [See Fossil Cirripedia 1: 3.]

Specimens SPW sent are very useful and interesting.

Summary

Thanks JWF and G. R. Waterhouse for cirripede specimens.

Summary

CD expresses his inability to accept the view that the Hippuritidae are in any way a connecting link between the oysters and the barnacles.

Summary

SPW and Waterhouse agree on island faunas; gives Australia and Tasmania as examples. The "stream of migration" from Asia to Tasmania.

Looks forward eagerly to the publication of CD’s "specific" researches.

Invites CD to send his memoranda [on Manual of Mollusca].

Summary

Proportion of molluscan species to genera in various periods. The difficulty of determining species increases with the number of species per genus. Identifying species within a genus is most difficult in that period in which the genus shows its greatest development.

Summary

Thanks for Supplement to SPW’s Manual of the Mollusca [1851–6]. Praises SPW’s work. "What an amount of labour is condensed in your little volume! … I fully believe & hope that you will reap the only reward worth having, the consciousness that you have done good service to the cause of Science."

Summary

Asks for reference to article by Kölliker, ["Some observations on the structure of two new species of Hectocotyle", Trans. Linn. Soc. Lond. 22 (1851): 9–22]. Asks for information.

Summary

Is pleased to support SPW’s application for a position in the fossil department at the British Museum.

Summary

Regrets he cannot answer SPW’s questions.

Discusses antiquity of subaerial volcanoes.

Disagrees "entirely & absolutely" with L. von Buch’s "elevation-crater-theory".

Summary

Note on cases of representative shells that are not clearly either varieties or species.

Summary

Thanks for answer to query. "I see … that there is no hope of comparing the same genus at two different periods, and seeing whether the tendency to vary is greater at one period in such genus than at another period."

Inclined to dispute SPW’s doctrine that islands are generally ancient. Doubts that they are remnants of continents.

Summary

Says he will call tomorrow to examine indicated specimens and books at Geological Society.

Summary

Has reduced 20 Cyrena species to geographical varieties of one species, Cyrena fluminalis. Hooker is reducing Indian flora at the rate of 19 to 1.

Recommends W. H. Harvey’s Seaside book [1849] and Charles Pickering’s Races of man [1850].

Summary

Gives directions to Down. Would be happy to see SPW but regrets they "have no attractions".

Agrees about colonisation of Arctic region.

CD thought that his St Helena land shells had quite recently become embedded; his specimens are at the Geological Society.

Can SPW ask A. Günther for any references to Silurus escaping from the Danube?

Summary

Queries from CD on the distribution of molluscan genera referring to SPW’s Manual of the Mollusca [pt 3 (1856)], with SPW’s answers.

Summary

Comments on SPW’s book [Manual of Mollusca (1851–6)].

Mentions questions he has for SPW [see 1890].

Summary

Lists Lusitanian shells with wide ranges beyond that geographical province.

Antiquity and elevation of land mass is more important than latitude for the distribution of shells.