Summary

Suspects WTT-D is the author of a good review of Erasmus Darwin in Nature [21 (1880): 245–7].

Summary

CD may not mean same thing as WTT-D by absorbent pegs in Abronia.

F. O. Bower’s paper on Welwitschia [germination] [Q. J. Microsc. Sci. 21 (1881): 15–30] will appear in January.

Has observed earthworms for CD: they do not draw Robinia leaves into burrows by the petioles.

Summary

Asa Gray wants seeds of a variety of cotton known as vine cotton.

Summary

Wants Ipomoea seeds for observing germination.

Summary

Thanks for cotton seeds.

Germination of Megarrhiza.

Summary

WTT-D’s suggestion about absorbent function of pegs in Abronia suggests origin of pegs in Welwitschia, which deeply interests CD. Previously could not see how pegs became large enough to be of mechanical use. Now thinks tissue between hypocotyl and radicle absorbs fluid, which would favour rise of peg to expose larger surface.

Rejects German contempt for investigating use of organs.

Asks WTT-D to observe how worms draw Robinia leaves into burrows.

Summary

Thanks for the letter from Volney Rattan [see 12553].

Discusses protective adaptation of seedlings from frost.

Summary

Asks WED to observe whether worms consistently draw acacia leaves into their burrows with a particular end first.

Will soon know whether he will need worm-castings from Beaulieu.

Summary

Signs a certificate sent to him by CD [see 12954].

Sends CD a ticket to his lecture on 25 February, in which he will propose that the mode by which the excitable parts of plants influence other parts at a distance is essentially the same as in the excitable structure of animals, contrary to the views of Hermann Munk and Julius Sachs.

Interested in chapters 6 and 7 of Movement in plants.

Summary

Describes the germination and early growth of Megarrhiza about which AG has been misinformed. The tubular petioles act functionally like a root.

Ipomoea did not germinate.

Summary

Praise for Movement in plants, lately arrived.

Praise for Wallace’s Island life

and astonishment that he could be a spiritualist.

Differs with Wallace on age of SW. Australian flora. JDH ascribes its peculiarities to isolation by an inland sea.

Summary

On Wallace’s pension and Frank’s F.R.S.