To Charles Lyell 22 May [1860]
Summary
Mentions American edition of Origin.
A "savage" review [by John Duns] in North British Review [32 (1860): 455–68].
Comments on views of G. H. K. Thwaites on the survival of simple forms as a problem in his theory.
Mentions imperfection of geological record.
Marine origin of coal.
Illness of Etty.
Encloses article by Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire on hare–rabbit crosses [Histoire naturelle générale (1854–62) 3: 222].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
| Date: | 22 May [1860] |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.213) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2812 |
From C. J. F. Bunbury 10 April 1855
Summary
Responds to CD’s questions about mountain vegetation of the Cape of Good Hope. The distribution of some plants provides problems for both migration and special creation hypotheses.
| Author: | Charles James Fox Bunbury, 8th baronet |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 10 Apr 1855 |
| Classmark: | DAR 205.4: 95 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1664 |
From J. B. Innes 17 December [1863]
Summary
Suggests a new school for CD’s son [Horace].
| Author: | John Brodie Innes |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 17 Dec [1863] |
| Classmark: | DAR 167: 13 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4357 |
From Isaac Anderson-Henry 26–7 January 1863
Summary
Has done extensive plant hybridisation: strawberry, raspberry, Rhododendron.
| Author: | Isaac Anderson; Isaac Anderson Henry |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 26–7 Jan 1863 |
| Classmark: | DAR 159: 61 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3948 |
From Erasmus Alvey Darwin 17 February [1866]
Summary
Suggests two ways of financing what Susan will owe Catherine’s estate.
| Author: | Erasmus Alvey Darwin |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 17 Feb [1866] |
| Classmark: | DAR 105: B53–4 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-5009 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … J. D. Hooker, 4 February 1866 and n. 1). Susan Elizabeth Darwin , CD and Erasmus’s sister. In his will of 27 September 1845 (Department of Manuscripts and Records, National Library of Wales), Robert Waring Darwin requested that his executors, Erasmus Alvey Darwin and CD, give his unmarried daughters the option of purchasing the furniture at the Mount, the family home in Shrewsbury, Shropshire, if they chose to continue living there. Susan and Catherine, who were unmarried when Robert died in 1848, …
From A. R. Wallace 31 January [1865]
Summary
Sends papers with comments. Convinced that the Aru pig is a species peculiar to New Guinea fauna, not a domestic animal that ran wild.
Admires CD’s paper ["Three forms of Lythrum", Collected papers 2: 106–31].
| Author: | Alfred Russel Wallace |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 31 Jan [1865] |
| Classmark: | DAR 106: B22–3 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4759 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 1848 to 1850. Spruce continued to collect plants in South America until his return to England at the end of May 1864 ( Wallace 1905 , 1: 276–9; Spruce 1908 , 1: xxxiv–xxxv, xlvi; DNB ). CD had written to Spruce for botanical information in 1863, although this letter has not been found (see Correspondence vol. 12, letter from A. R. Wallace, 2 January 1864 ; see also letter from Richard Spruce to J. D. Hooker, …
From George Rolleston 22 February 1871
Summary
Applauds CD’s expression of dissent from J. S. Mill’s view of differences of mental powers of men and women [Descent 2: 326–9]. Sends some corrections.
| Author: | George Rolleston |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 22 Feb 1871 |
| Classmark: | DAR 87: 15–16 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-7506 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 1848 , although p. 192 seems to be an incorrect reference. This error was corrected in the second printing of Descent . Printer’s devil: the apprentice or errand-boy in a printer’s office ( OED s.v. printer). James McCann was the author of Anti-Darwinism (see Correspondence vol. 17, letter from J. D. Hooker, …
From George Bentham [before 22 April 1868]
Summary
Has studied Variation with interest.
Cannot quite follow CD on reversion and Pangenesis,
but is amazed at CD’s observations and method.
Comments on varieties of asses, kidney beans, and artichokes.
| Author: | George Bentham |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | [before 22 Apr 1868] |
| Classmark: | DAR 160: 160 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-6134 |
To Asa Gray 29 November [1857]
Summary
Thanks AG for his criticisms of CD’s views; finds it difficult to avoid using the term "natural selection" as an agent.
Discusses crossing in Fumaria and barnacles.
Has received a naturally crossed kidney bean in which the seed-coat has been affected by the pollen of the fertilising plant.
Finds the rule of large genera having most varieties holds good and regards it as most important for his "principle of divergence".
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Asa Gray |
| Date: | 29 Nov [1857] |
| Classmark: | Archives of the Gray Herbarium, Harvard University (18) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2176 |
From J. D. Hooker [29 December 1861]
Summary
Asks CD whether he hears from Asa Gray. JDH’s opinion of the crisis [Trent case, Nov 1861] and the American Civil War.
Julius von Haast alludes to glacial drift in Middle Island of New Zealand.
Backwardness of JDH’s son, Willy.
Encloses a reference from Daniel Oliver which may be useful.
| Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | [29 Dec 1861] |
| Classmark: | DAR 101: 1, 2a–c |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3374 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … J. D. Hooker, [30 and 31 December 1861] . James Hector was preparing to leave for New Zealand, where he was to assume the position of geologist to the provincial government of Otago ( DNB ). In the fourth edition of Origin , CD cited information provided by Hector concerning evidence of past glacial action in New Zealand ( Origin 4th ed. , p. 443). Haast 1861 , pp. 89–124. Lestiboudois 1848 . …
To Charles Lyell [16 June 1848]
Summary
Comments on Ann Susan Horner’s escape in a dangerous incident at sea.
Compares addresses by William Buckland and CL, delivered at recent meeting of the Geological Society.
Discusses the views on Glen Roy in Chambers’ Ancient sea-margins [1848].
Speculates that Chambers wrote Vestiges [of creation (1844)].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
| Date: | [16 June 1848] |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.73) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1186 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 1848 , p. 319. Chambers cited CD’s theory of coral reef formation as justification for his own suggestion. Robert Chambers’s authorship of Vestiges of the natural history of creation ( [Chambers] 1844 ) was widely known by 1854 ( A. Desmond 1982 , p. 210 n. 28). See Correspondence vol. 3, letters to J. D. Hooker, [ …
From S. P. Woodward 2 May 1856
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.
| Author: | Samuel Pickworth Woodward |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 2 May 1856 |
| Classmark: | DAR 181: 153 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1864 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 1848 . Hugh Cuming had made one of the most extensive collections of shells of the time, which he gave to the British Museum . Pfeiffer and Gérard Paul Deshayes had both prepared catalogues for the British Museum of various families from Cuming’s collection. John Edward Gray himself had a reputation for needlessly coining new specific and generic names ( DNB ). See also letter from Charles Lyell, 1–2 May 1856 . J. D. Hooker …
To J. D. Hooker 8 April [1856]
Summary
Mustering support at Royal Society Council for John Lindley’s Copley Medal. CD thinks Albany Hancock deserves a Royal Medal.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 8 Apr [1856] |
| Classmark: | DAR 114: 160 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1851 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 1848 to 1853, had been a member of council in 1854 and 1855. Edward Sabine , as treasurer of the Royal Society, was ‘Senior Vice-President de facto although not de jure ’ ( Hall 1984 , p. 132). Lindley had twice been an unsuccessful candidate for a Royal Medal. As well as being nominated by Miers in 1855 (see n. 3, above), he had been proposed by Hooker in 1853 ( Correspondence vol. 5, letter from J. D. …
From J. D. Hooker 25 August 1854
Summary
JDH and F. W. Binney identify Calamites specimens as pith casts. They are cryptogams related to, but higher than, Lycopodiaceae and contradict progression.
Insects found in coal.
Lyell says Stonesfield slate marsupials are actually placentals.
JDH reading Alexander Braun on individuality ["Das Individuum der Pflanze in seinem Verhältniss zur Species", Abh. K. Akad. Wiss. Berlin (Phys. Kl.) (1853): 19–122].
| Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 25 Aug 1854 |
| Classmark: | DAR 205.9: 384 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1581 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … J. D. Hooker, [late February 1845] and n. 5. The gymnosperms were, at this time, thought to be the only group of plants that could be impregnated by the pollen acting directly on a naked ovule rather than on the plant’s stigma. Hooker’s experiments on Meconopsis , an angiosperm, indicated that it could be fertilised in the same manner as gymnosperms. Adrien Henri Laurent de Jussieu’s article on taxonomy first appeared in the Dictionnaire universel d’histoire naturelle ( Jussieu 1848 ). …
From Edward Blyth 4 August 1855
Summary
Sends a skeleton of a Bengal jungle cock.
Has never heard of trained otters breeding in captivity.
Introduced domestic rabbits are confined to the ports of India.
Canaries and other tame finches and thrushes brought into India do not breed well.
Origin of the domestic canary. Tendency of domesticated birds to produce "top-knot" varieties.
The tame geese of lower Bengal are hybrids; those of upper Bengal are said to be pure Anser cygnoides.
Wild Anser cinereus occur in flocks in the cold season.
Discusses at length different breeds of domestic cats and possible wild progenitors. Wild and domestic cats occasionally interbreed. The Angora variety breeds freely with the common Bengal cat and all stages of intermediates can be found.
Believes pigeons have been bred in India since remote antiquity.
Discusses whether mankind is divided into races or distinct species.
[CD’s notes are an abstract of this letter.]
| Author: | Edward Blyth |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 4 Aug 1855 |
| Classmark: | DAR 98: A69–A78 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1735 |
Matches: 1 hit
| letter | (115) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (69) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (23) |
| Gray, Asa | (4) |
| Blyth, Edward | (3) |
| Anderson Henry, Isaac | (1) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (45) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (34) |
| Lyell, Charles | (5) |
| Henslow, J. S. | (3) |
| Gray, Asa | (2) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (114) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (57) |
| Gray, Asa | (6) |
| Lyell, Charles | (5) |
| Blyth, Edward | (3) |
