To G. H. K. Thwaites 26 March 1877
Summary
Thanks for specimens [of insects].
Wonders whether difference between male and female plays part in fertilisation of fig.
Flowers of Oxalis sensitiva, sent long ago, are trimorphic and cleistogamic.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | George Henry Kendrick Thwaites |
| Date: | 26 Mar 1877 |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.508) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-10913 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … letter from G. H. K. Thwaites, 28 August 1877 . CD discovered ‘complemental males’ in several species of Cirripedia; he observed minute males attached to the bodies of hermaphrodites, and differing greatly from them in size and structure (see Living Cirripedia (1851) , pp. 231–2 and 281–93, Living Cirripedia (1854) , …
To Gardeners’ Chronicle 3 January [1877]
Summary
Suggests that the scarcity of holly berries is owing to the scarcity of bees during the spring, rather than to frost. He does not know what caused the scarcity of bees.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Gardeners’ Chronicle |
| Date: | 3 Jan [1877] |
| Classmark: | Gardeners’ Chronicle, 6 January 1877, p. 19 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-10769 |
From J. D. Hooker 18 June 1877
Summary
JDH recounts circumstances of his receiving Star of India (K.C.S.I.).
| Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 18 June 1877 |
| Classmark: | DAR 104: 90–1 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-11006 |
From T. A. B. Spratt 2 January 1877
Summary
TABS is pleased that CD found something of interest in his researches in Crete [Travels and researches in Crete (1869)].
| Author: | Thomas Abel Brimage Spratt |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 2 Jan 1877 |
| Classmark: | DAR 177: 240 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-10767 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 1854) , for which he was acknowledged in the preface. Francis Beaufort was hydrographer to the navy from 1829 to 1855, during which time he planned and directed numerous surveys ( ODNB ). CD’s participation in the HMS Beagle voyage of 1831–6 had been approved by Beaufort ( Narrative 2: 18–19). CD’s letter …
From A. A. van Bemmelen and H. J. Veth 6 February 1877
Summary
A letter from CD’s admirers in the Netherlands, sent with an album of their photographs, in celebration of his sixty-eighth birthday.
Presents an account of early efforts in the Netherlands in the direction of developmental theories, and evidence of the support and enthusiastic reception given CD’s theory.
| Author: | Adriaan Anthoni van Bemmelen; Huibert Johannes Veth |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 6 Feb 1877 |
| Classmark: | English Heritage, Down House (EH 88202653) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-10831 |
| letter | (5) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (2) |
| Bemmelen, A. A. van | (1) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (1) |
| Spratt, T. A. B. | (1) |
| Veth, H. J. | (1) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (3) |
| Gardeners’ Chronicle | (1) |
| Thwaites, G. H. K. | (1) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (5) |
| Bemmelen, A. A. van | (1) |
| Gardeners’ Chronicle | (1) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (1) |
| Spratt, T. A. B. | (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: 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 …
