To John Lubbock [September 1854]
Summary
Sends beetle he cannot identify.
Reading J. O. Westwood [Introduction to the modern classification of insects (1839–40)] has reawakened his passion for entomology.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | John Lubbock, 4th baronet and 1st Baron Avebury |
Date: | [Sept 1854] |
Classmark: | DAR 263: 8 (EH 88206457) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1585 |
To J. S. Henslow 2 September [1854]
Summary
Sends his comments on JSH’s MS on cirripedes ["On typical objects in natural history", Rep. BAAS (1855): 108–26].
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | John Stevens Henslow |
Date: | 2 Sept [1854] |
Classmark: | California State Library, San Francisco, Sutro Library (Crocker collection: folder #11) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1586 |
To T. H. Huxley 2 September [1854]
Summary
Second Living Cirripedia volume published. Asks THH’s advice on presentation copies for continental naturalists.
THH’s review of Vestiges of creation in [Br. & Foreign Med.-Chir. Rev. 13 (1854)]. CD is almost as unorthodox on species as the author of Vestiges, but hopes not quite so unphilosophical.
Hopes L. Agassiz was sounder on embryological stages than THH thinks.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Thomas Henry Huxley |
Date: | 2 Sept [1854] |
Classmark: | Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine Archives (Huxley 5: 8) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1587 |
To J. D. Hooker 7 September [1854]
Summary
On individuality.
Huxley’s review exquisite, but too severe on Vestiges; sorry for ridicule of Agassiz’s embryonic fishes.
Stonesfield mammals.
J. O. Westwood deserves Royal Society Medal.
Will begin species work in a few days.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | 7 Sept [1854] |
Classmark: | DAR 114: 124 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1588 |
To Japetus Steenstrup 7 September [1854]
Summary
Offers to send collection of cirripedes to Copenhagen Museum in return for assistance in his research. Mentions publication of Living Cirripedia, vol. 2.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Johannes Japetus Smith (Japetus) Steenstrup |
Date: | 7 Sept [1854] |
Classmark: | Det Kongelige Bibliotek, Copenhagen (NKS 3460 4to); Natural History Museum of Denmark |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1589 |
To T. H. Huxley 8 September [1854]
Summary
Agrees with THH on metamorphosis of branchiae of Balanus, and on his view of Owen.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Thomas Henry Huxley |
Date: | 8 Sept [1854] |
Classmark: | Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine Archives (Huxley 5: 11) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1590 |
To A. A. Gould 9 September [1854]
Summary
Returns cirripede specimens to AAG. Encloses specimens for Louis Agassiz in same box.
Since AAG is a member of the Ray Society, will not send him a copy of Living Cirripedia, vol. 2.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Augustus Addison Gould |
Date: | 9 Sept [1854] |
Classmark: | Houghton Library, Harvard University (Augustus A. Gould papers, 1831–66 MS Am 1210: 225) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1591 |
To T. H. Huxley 13 September [1854]
Summary
Thanks for help on presentation copies of Living Cirripedia, vol. 2.
Suggests he examine cementing apparatus of Balanus.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Thomas Henry Huxley |
Date: | 13 Sept [1854] |
Classmark: | Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine Archives (Huxley 5: 16) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1592 |
To a librarian [early September? 1854]
Summary
Will return all but two volumes; requests four titles, including Pepys’s Diaries, but not the first volume.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Librarian |
Date: | [early Sept? 1854] |
Classmark: | The British Library (Surrogate RP 9763) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1592F |
From Richard Thomas Lowe 19 September 1854
Summary
The land shells, both fossil and recent, of Madeira and Porto Santo have features peculiar to them, so RTL would have no difficulty in identifying them.
Author: | Richard Thomas Lowe |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 19 Sept 1854 |
Classmark: | DAR 205.9: 392 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1593 |
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 George Henry Turnbull 28 October [1854]
Summary
CD writes as the Treasurer of the Down Coal and Clothing Club and the Down Friendly Club, requesting subscriptions.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | George Henry Turnbull |
Date: | 28 Oct [1854] |
Classmark: | DAR 261.11: 2 (EH 88206054) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1595 |
To J. D. Hooker [November–December 1854]
Summary
[Recto:] CD defines "aberrant genus".
[Verso:] JDH’s list of families, [presumably] with aberrant genera, and [presumably] the number of species in each genus.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | [Nov–Dec 1854] |
Classmark: | DAR 114: 222a |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1596 |
To J. D. Hooker 5 November [1854]
Summary
Congratulates JDH on receipt of Royal Medal.
CD gathering facts on aberrant genera of insects.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | 5 Nov [1854] |
Classmark: | DAR 114: 152 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1597 |
From G. R. Waterhouse 11 November 1854
Summary
Sends list of aberrant forms of Curculionidae.
Discusses in detail the artificiality of Carl Johan Schönherr’s classification. Sound generalisations about geographical distribution depend on sound classifications. Warns against putting too much faith in current catalogues.
Author: | George Robert Waterhouse |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 11 Nov 1854 |
Classmark: | DAR 205.9: 401 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1598 |
To Daniel Sharpe 12 November [1854]
Summary
Regrets he cannot come to hear DS’s paper ["On the structure of Mont Blanc", Q. J. Geol. Soc. Lond. 11 (1855): 11–27]. Has a lively interest in the subject.
Edward Forbes has misrepresented his view on foliation and cleavage [Athenæum 30 Sept 1854].
CD is convinced DS’s view will replace Huttonian and Lyellian view of metamorphic schists.
Recommends H. C. Sorby’s paper [probably "On the origin of slaty cleavage", Edinburgh New Philos. J. 55 (1853): 137–50].
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Daniel Sharpe |
Date: | 12 Nov [1854] |
Classmark: | University of Chicago Library, Special Collections Research Center |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1599 |
From J. D. Hooker [6 November 1854]
Summary
Fossil leaves from Disko Island.
JDH to begin working out the botanical geography of the polar sea.
Has not forgotten CD’s request on aberrant species.
Has taken a house on Richmond Hill.
Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | [6 Nov 1854] |
Classmark: | DAR 205.9: 385 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1600 |
To J. D. Hooker 15 November [1854]
Summary
Calculating small number of species in aberrant genera of insects and plants.
Joachim Barrande’s "Colonies", Élie de Beaumont’s "lines of Elevation", Forbes’s "Polarity" make CD despair, as these theories lead to conclusions opposite to CD’s from the same classes of facts.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | 15 Nov [1854] |
Classmark: | DAR 114: 156 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1601 |
To J. S. Henslow 17 November [1854]
Summary
Asks JSH to inquire about drift-wood at Kerguelen Land.
Hooker’s observation on similarity of Kerguelen plant species to those of Tierra del Fuego strikes CD as a great anomaly, so he is searching for an answer, "however improbable".
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | John Stevens Henslow |
Date: | 17 Nov [1854] |
Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.109) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1602 |
To Walter Baldock Durrant Mantell 17 November 1854
Summary
Requests authoritative information on erratic boulders and marks of glaciers in New Zealand, and especially in southern islands.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Walter Baldock Durrant Mantell |
Date: | 17 Nov 1854 |
Classmark: | Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand (Mantell papers, MS-Papers-0083-268) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1603 |
letter | (74) |
Darwin, C. R. | (59) |
Hooker, J. D. | (10) |
Watson, H. C. | (2) |
Garrett, J. R. | (1) |
Lowe, R. T. | (1) |
Darwin, C. R. | (14) |
Hooker, J. D. | (14) |
Higgins, John | (5) |
Henslow, J. S. | (3) |
Huxley, T. H. | (3) |
Bernard, H. L. | (1) |
Bosquet, J. A. H. de | (2) |
Darwin, C. R. | (73) |
Galton, Francis | (1) |
Garrett, J. R. | (1) |
Gould, A. A. | (1) |
Gray, J. E. | (1) |
Grove, W. R. | (1) |
Hancock, Albany | (1) |
Henslow, J. S. | (3) |
Higgins, John | (5) |
Holland, Saba | (1) |
Hooker, J. D. | (24) |
Huxley, T. H. | (3) |
King, P. G. | (1) |
Librarian | (1) |
Lowe, R. T. | (1) |
Lubbock, J. W. (b) | (1) |
Lubbock, John | (1) |
Lyell, Charles | (1) |
Mackintosh, F. E. E. | (1) |
Mantell, W. B. D. | (1) |
Palaeontographical Society | (1) |
Patterson, Robert | (3) |
Price, John | (1) |
Ramsay, A. C. | (1) |
Ray Society | (1) |
Sabine, Edward | (3) |
Salt, Thomas | (1) |
Sharpe, Daniel | (1) |
Smith, Saba | (1) |
Steenstrup, Japetus | (1) |
Stutchbury, H. L. | (1) |
Turnbull, G. H. | (2) |
Unidentified | (1) |
Waterhouse, G. R. | (2) |
Watson, H. C. | (2) |
Wedgwood, F. E. E. | (1) |
Wedgwood, Josiah, III | (1) |
Woodward, S. P. | (1) |
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: 5 hits
- … cirripedes and culminated in Living Cirripedia (1854) and Fossil Cirripedia (1854), again …
- … series of letters pertaining to the Royal Society. In April 1854, when his cirripede study was …
- … indicated by his comment in a letter to Hooker on 29 [May 1854] : ‘Very far from disagreeing with …
- … Back to species theory In September 1854, as soon as the final proofs of the last barnacle …
- … do as I wish it Throughout the correspondence of 1854 and 1855, the overwhelming …
Darwin and Down
Summary
Charles and Emma Darwin, with their first two children, settled at Down House in the village of Down (later ‘Downe’) in Kent, as a young family in 1842. The house came with eighteen acres of land, and a fifteen acre meadow. The village combined the…
Matches: 1 hits
- … [24 July 1842] To P. G. King, 21 February 1854 : ‘I live in the country about 16 miles …
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…
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: 23 hits
- … [Wellesley 1832] Sir. W. Nott’s Life [W. Nott 1854].— [DAR *119: 15v.] From …
- … de la Boheme [Barrande 1852–1911] must be deeply studied 1854 The Zoologist by E. Newman [ …
- … [Pepys 1825] (Read).— Sir W. Notts life [W. Nott 1854] read [DAR *128: 177] …
- … r . Nott & Gliddon: Trübner & Co [J. C. Nott and Gliddon 1854] (read) A Lecture by …
- … not published but reported fully in Literary Gazette Sept 30 1854 91 Agricult. Journal …
- … d’un Naturaliste A. de Quatrefages [Quatrefages de Bréau 1854]. (light reading) (??) read …
- … Domestic animals. 94 Lloyd Scandinavian Adventures 1854 [L. Lloyd 1854]. praised in …
- … sur les Migration des Vegetaux 4 to Pamphlet [Godron 1854] (read) Journal of Asiatic Soc. …
- … specially of central platform of France 8 fr. [Lecoq 1854–8] Read Journal de la Soc. Imp. d …
- … Sir J. Lubbock. member Ferguson on Poultry [Ferguson 1854], recommended by M r Brent, but …
- … D r . Badham “Ancient & Modern Tattle” on Fish [Badham 1854]. M r Tegetmeier says very …
- … (read) From Nott & Gliddon [J. C. Nott and Gliddon 1854] Roselini Monumenta [ …
- … Carboniferous strata, translated in Bull. General [Heer 1854].— Hooker has it.— Very important …
- … I ought to read Murchinson’s Siluria [Murchison 1854]— I must read it. & buy it.— …
- … W. R. Wilde in Dublin University Magazine early month of 1854 on food of Irish. ( Pig ) [Wilde] …
- … translated into French by Gaudin—with additions [Heer 1854]. Archives du Museum [ Archives …
- … Himmalaya [T. Thomson 1852] [DAR 128: 7] 1854 Jan 11 th . Pulsky Red, …
- … 1848]. March 7 th . Hooker’s Himmalaya [Hooker 1854].— —— 23 Stansbury. Exploration …
- … July 3 d . Sir B. B. Psychological Essays [Brodie] 1854] —— Duval Histoire du Pommier, …
- … Isidore Geoffroy St. Hilaire [I. Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire 1854–62] Tome I [DAR 128: 9] …
- … Williams Missionary in T. del Fuego [Hamilton 1854] March 28 th . Sir G. Stephens Lectures …
- … Richardson 1784] (poor) [DAR 128: 10] 1854. Microscopical Journal [ …
- … 1855. Wollastons Insecta Maderensia [Wollaston 1854] —— Johnston Physical Atlas [A. K. …
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…
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: 5 hits
- … on the crustacean sub-class Cirripedia between 1851 and 1854, two on living species and two on …
- … in manuscript form to the Ray Society at the beginning of 1854 , where it took longer than the ‘ …
- … to tell his friend Thomas Henry Huxley in early September 1854, ‘ My second volume on the …
- … Society; the monograph itself was printed in 1854. This volume appears not to have been discussed …
- … but he wrote to the Palaeontographical Society in February 1854 and the society confirmed that he …
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: 3 hits
- … sub-class of Crustacea, Living Cirripedia (1851, 1854) and Fossil Cirripedia (1851, 1854). …
- … spermatozoa’ attached to the female (Living Cirripedia (1854): 23). Darwin had previously worked out …
- … from monoecious forms (Living Cirripedia (1851): 214; (1854): 29, 528 n.) and, at another level, to …
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: 13 hits
- … Darwin’s work on barnacles, conducted between 1846 and 1854, has long posed problems for historians. …
- … In both volumes of Living Cirripedia (1851 and 1854), Darwin devoted an introductory section to …
- … was best placed among the Lepadidae ( Living Cirripedia (1854): 527–8).^1^1^ Both …
- … segments are quite aborted . . . ( Living Cirripedia (1854): 562–3) Indeed, …
- … be the most natural arrangement. ( Living Cirripedia (1854): 588) The fact that the …
- … with his figure of the mature animal ( Living Cirripedia (1854), Plate XXV). Throughout …
- … (1851): 37–8) In Living Cirripedia (1854), Darwin ventured to suggest the possible …
- … by a new and anomalous course. ( Living Cirripedia (1854): 151–2) Crisp (1983) has …
- … from bisexuality to unisexuality. ( Living Cirripedia (1854): 29)^16^ Darwin’s …
- … merely varieties (Southward 1983). In Living Cirripedia (1854), Darwin clearly stated the …
- … be found eminently variable. ( Living Cirripedia (1854): 155) One of the first …
- … a very direct and curious manner’ ( Living Cirripedia (1854): 529). Modern systematists place …
- … nature was demonstrated.’ ( Living Cirripedia (1854): 555). See also Rachootin 1984, pp. 235–6. …
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: 4 hits
- … the start a cautious and sometimes a difficult one. In 1854-5 the newly established firm of Henry …
- … who thought that ‘it was probably taken in the year 1854, but he had never seen it’. A slot in the …
- … Walker, dated 1912; the photograph itself is here dated 1854, and accompanied by a facsimile of …
- … Polyblank, photographers date of creation 1854 or early 1855 computer-readable …
People featured in the Dutch photograph album
Summary
Here is a list of people that appeared in the photograph album Darwin received for his birthday on 12 February 1877 from scientific admirers in the Netherlands. Many thanks to Hester Loeff for identifying and researching them. No. …
Matches: 6 hits
- … Dramatist 23 Middelburg 20 june 1854 Middelburg 13 october …
- … Deventer 11 september 1854 Deventer 8 march 1936 Haarlem …
- … Phil.nat.cand Leiden 18 july 1854 Batavia 8 march 1896 …
- … University. Utrecht 16 april 1854 Amsterdam 4 january 1928 …
- … Phil.nat.cand. Utrecht 16 april 1854 Amsterdam 4 january …
- … Phil.nat.stud Leiden 19 august 1854 Oud-Beijerland 23 …
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…
People featured in the Dutch photograph album
Summary
List of people appearing in the photograph album Darwin received from scientific admirers in the Netherlands for his birthday on 12 February 1877. We are grateful to Hester Loeff for providing this list and for permission to make her research available.…
Matches: 6 hits
- … Dramatist 23 Middelburg 20 June 1854 Middelburg 13 October …
- … Deventer 11 September 1854 Deventer 8 March 1936 Haarlem …
- … Phil.nat.cand Leiden 18 July 1854 Batavia 8 March 1896 …
- … University. Utrecht 16 April 1854 Amsterdam 4 January 1928 …
- … Phil.nat.cand. Utrecht 16 April 1854 Amsterdam 4 January …
- … Phil.nat.stud Leiden 19 August 1854 Oud-Beijerland 23 …
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…
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
- … used in a strict sense. Thus a letter dated ‘after 8 July 1854’ is judged to have been written very …
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
- … in major cities of the US and Canada on physiognomy in 1854. In 1866 he sought training in anatomy …
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
- … Letter 1585 — Darwin, C. R. to Lubbock, John, [Sept 1854] Darwin sends Lubbock a beetle he …
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: 5 hits
- … of logical thought and language. On 20 May 1854, Darwin again took over the notebook and, …
- … a bit of red glass at the garden) 47v. May 1854. Before tea Ch. asked Lenny P. Have you …
- … give me a kiss if you like”. 48 [74] May 20— 1854.— I saw a pile of sand lying on the lawn …
- … I could not help it awfully”.— 49 June 1854— About 9 months ago, Lenny defined being in …
- … Horace Lenny. When ill with Fever & recovering (Dec 1854) used constantly to ask in the …
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…
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
- … Darwin (with a caption querying the date, and suggesting ‘1854?’). It was reproduced …
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
- … able to finance another extended voyage to Malaysia. Between 1854 and 1862, he travelled some 14,000 …