To J. D. Hooker 23 [December 1859]
Summary
Received JDH’s introduction to Flora Tasmaniae.
Criticism of C. V. Naudin’s descent theory.
Asks that Lyell be allowed to see letter.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 23 [Dec 1859] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 32 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2595 |
To J. D. Hooker 23 October [1861]
Summary
JDH’s work on Gnetum: a living fossil.
Orchid anatomy.
Encloses lists of orchids and other specimens he would be interested in seeing.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 23 Oct [1861] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 121, 126a, 124a |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3296 |
To J. D. Hooker 15 [October 1861]
Summary
Orchid anatomy. Wind as agent of self-fertilisation in orchids.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 15 [Oct 1861] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 119 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3286 |
To J. D. Hooker 9 February [1865]
Summary
Falconer’s death haunts him. Personal annihilation not so horrifying to him as sun cooling some day and human race ending.
His health has been wretched.
Masters has written his agreement with CD’s "Climbing plants".
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 9 Feb [1865] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 260 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4769 |
To J. D. Hooker 25 [December 1859]
Summary
CD will not write to L. Descaisne to defend his priority over C. V. Naudin.
Feels success of theory depends on acceptance and application by good and well-known workers, like JDH, Huxley, and Lyell.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 25 [Dec 1859] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 31 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2602 |
To J. D. Hooker 24 April [1855]
Summary
More on seed-salting. JDH’s admission that he expected seeds to die in a week gives CD "a nice little triumph".
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 24 Apr [1855] |
| Classmark: | DAR 114: 130 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1671 |
To J. D. Hooker 27 [or 28 September 1865]
Summary
Agrees with JDH on difference in grief over loss of father and of child. His love of his father.
The Reader.
Politics and science.
Health improved by Bence Jones’s diet.
[Dated "Thursday 27th" by CD.]
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | [27 or 28] Sept 1865 |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 275 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4901 |
To J. D. Hooker 3 June [1857]
Summary
"Law" [see 2092] correlating variability and abnormal development not confirmed by JDH for plants.
CD studies struggle for existence in his weed garden.
Scotch fir observed at Moor Park.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 3 June [1857] |
| Classmark: | DAR 114: 200 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2101 |
To J. D. Hooker 18 October [1861]
Summary
Orchid anatomy. Movements of labellum.
Repeating Gärtner’s experiment with Verbascum varieties.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 18 Oct [1861] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 120 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3288 |
To J. D. Hooker 16 [May 1857]
Summary
Asks JDH’s opinion, and botanical evidence, on important law: parts that are highly developed in comparison to other allied species are very variable.
Interest in hairiness of alpine plants revived by reading A. Moquin-Tandon [Éléments de tératologie végétale (1841)]; correlation with dryness. CD seeks interpretation independent of direct environmental effect.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 16 [May 1857] |
| Classmark: | DAR 114: 197 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2092 |
To J. D. Hooker [April 1852]
Summary
Questions on variation in nature: taxa varying in one region but not another. Variation between vs within species. Rarity of variation in important organs within a species. G. R. Waterhouse’s views on variation in highly developed organs, which CD relates to variation in rudimentary organs.
Asks for cases of obligate self-fertilising plants.
[CD annotation proposes using the Steudel Nomenclator botanicus (1821–4) to determine if variable species occur in genera with many species.]
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | [Apr 1852] |
| Classmark: | DAR 107: 66–7 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1496 |
To J. D. Hooker 21 [December 1859]
Summary
Delighted JDH coming to Down. They will discuss Origin. JDH’s remarks that theory explains too much are excellent, yet CD cannot see his error.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 21 [Dec 1859] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 28 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2591 |
To J. D. Hooker 14 [July 1855]
Summary
CD experiments: sowing seeds in fields; "breaking" seeds’ constitution with coloured light; plant hybridisation. Compiling works on hybridism.
Respect for W. B. Carpenter.
Note on "nectar secreting" to Gardeners’ Chronicle [Collected papers 1: 258–9].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 14 [July 1855] |
| Classmark: | DAR 114: 141 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1717 |
To J. D. Hooker 26 March [1854]
Summary
CD welcomes the prospect of the Philosophical Club of the Royal Society as means for seeing old acquaintances and making new ones. Will try to go up to London regularly.
Admits that the warning from JDH and Asa Gray (that more harm than good will come from combat over the species issue) makes him feel "deuced uncomfortable".
Reflects upon the complexity of Agassiz; how singular that a man of his eminence and immense knowledge "should write such wonderful stuff & bosh".
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 26 Mar [1854] |
| Classmark: | DAR 114: 120 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1562 |
Matches: 3 hits
- … the letter, see DAR 205.2: 102. Schleiden 1848 , Wallace 1853 , and Stansbury 1852 . CD’s …
- … 1852, may have attended one of Agassiz’s frequent public lectures ( K. M. Lyell ed. 1881 , 2: 176). In his letter …
- … letters and journals of Sir Charles Lyell, Bart. 2 vols. London: John Murray. Schleiden, Matthias Jacob. 1848. The plant; a biography. In a series of popular lectures. Translated by Arthur Henfrey. London. Stansbury, Howard. 1852. …
To J. D. Hooker 31 [January 1860]
Summary
CD preparing historical sketch, which will go into second American edition of Origin.
Asks JDH to copy out Naudin’s line on finality.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 31 [Jan 1860] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 38 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2671 |
To J. D. Hooker 3 August [1863]
Summary
Tendril plants received.
Has just completed large crossing experiment with Lythrum.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 3 Aug [1863] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 201 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4261 |
To J. D. Hooker 23 January [1859]
Summary
Wallace has written and is well satisfied with the joint presentation.
CD requests some facts to make case in his abstract for former glacial action in Himalayas.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 23 Jan [1859] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 3 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2403 |
To J. D. Hooker 30 September [1857]
Summary
C. F. Ledebour [Flora rossica (1842–53)] particularly useful for variety tabulation. Results generally favourable.
Additions to Down House.
Last two chapters of MS took six months to write.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 30 Sept [1857] |
| Classmark: | DAR 114: 210 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2148 |
To J. D. Hooker 22 [May 1864]
Summary
CD’s pleasure at JDH’s willingness to help Scott find a position in India.
Naudin underrates contamination of his experiments by insects. Thus CD doubts Naudin’s results on rapidity and universality of reversion in hybrids.
Wallace’s paper on man [see 4494] reflects his genius, although CD does not fully agree with it.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 22 [May 1864] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 236 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4506 |
To J. D. Hooker 25 [August 1863]
Summary
CD’s illness: he is vomiting "vegetable" cells.
Dutrochet has published the best of CD’s observations on tendrils [see Climbing plants, p. 1 n.].
Lyell has found Joshua Trimmer’s Arctic shells on Moel Tryfan.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 25 [Aug 1863] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 204 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4274 |
Matches: 2 hits
- … letters, 1792–1896. Edited by Henrietta Litchfield. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1915. Hooker, Joseph Dalton. 1852. …
- … 1852 ); there is a presentation copy of the pamphlet in the Darwin Pamphlet Collection–CUL. The reference is to the French plant physiologist René Joachim Henri Dutrochet and to Dutrochet 1843 and 1844 (see letter …
| letter | (35) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (33) |
| Darwin, Emma | (2) |
| Wedgwood, Emma | (2) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (35) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (33) |
| Darwin, Emma | (2) |
| Wedgwood, Emma | (2) |
Edward Lumb
Summary
Edward Lumb was born in Yorkshire. According to the memoirs of his daughter Anne, Lady Macdonell, he travelled to Buenos Aires aged sixteen with his merchant uncle, Charles Poynton, and after some fortunate enterprises set up in business there. In 1833…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Edward Lumb was born in Yorkshire. According to the memoirs of his daughter Anne, Lady Macdonell, …
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 Fatherhood
Summary
Charles Darwin married Emma Wedgwood in 1839 and over the next seventeen years the couple had ten children. It is often assumed that Darwin was an exceptional Victorian father. But how extraordinary was he? The Correspondence Project allows an unusually…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Charles Darwin married Emma Wedgwood in 1839 and over the next seventeen years the couple had ten …
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 …
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 …
'An Appeal' against animal cruelty
Summary
The four-page pamphlet transcribed below and entitled 'An Appeal', was composed jointly by Emma and Charles Darwin (see letter from Emma Darwin to W. D. Fox, [29 September 1863]). The pamphlet, which protested against the cruelty of steel vermin…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The four-page pamphlet transcribed below and entitled 'An Appeal', was composed jointly by Emma …
Darwin's health
Summary
On 28 March 1849, ten years before Origin was published, Darwin wrote to his good friend Joseph Hooker from Great Malvern in Worcestershire, where Dr James Manby Gully ran a fashionable water-cure establishment. Darwin apologised for his delayed reply to…
Matches: 1 hits
- … On 28 March 1849, ten years before Origin was published, Darwin wrote to his good friend …
3.9 Leonard Darwin, photo on horseback
Summary
< Back to Introduction It is so rare to encounter an image of Darwin in a specific locale that a family photograph of him riding his horse Tommy takes on a special interest. He is at the front of Down House, the door of which is open; it seems as…
Matches: 1 hits
- … < Back to Introduction It is so rare to encounter an image of Darwin in a specific …
New material added to the American edition of Origin
Summary
A ‘revised and augmented’ American edition of Origin came on the market in July 1860, and was the only authorised edition available in the US until 1873. It incorporated many of the changes Darwin made to the second English edition, but still contained…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The ‘historical sketch’ printed as a preface to the American edition ( Origin US ed., pp …
George Busk
Summary
After the Beagle voyage, Darwin’s collection of bryozoans disappears from the records until the material was sent, in 1852, for study by George Busk, one of the foremost workers on the group of his day. In 1863, on the way down to Malvern Wells, Darwin had…
Matches: 1 hits
- … After the Beagle voyage, Darwin’s collection of bryozoans disappears from the records until …
Hermann Müller
Summary
Hermann (Heinrich Ludwig Hermann) Müller, was born in Mühlberg near Erfurt in 1829. He was the younger brother of Fritz Müller (1822–97). Following the completion of his secondary education at Erfurt in 1848, he studied natural sciences at Halle and Berlin…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Hermann (Heinrich Ludwig Hermann) Müller, was born in Mühlberg near Erfurt in 1829. He was the …
Jane Gray
Summary
Jane Loring Gray, the daughter of a Boston lawyer, married the Harvard botanist Asa Gray in 1848 and evidence suggests that she took an active interest in the scientific pursuits of her husband and his friends. Although she is only known to have…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Jane Loring Gray, the daughter of a Boston lawyer, married the Harvard botanist Asa Gray in 1848 …
Wearing his knowledge lightly: From Fritz Müller, 5 April 1878
Summary
Darwin received letters from so many people and wrote so many fascinating letters himself, that it’s hard to choose from many letters that stand out, but one of this editor’s favourites, that always brings a smile, is a letter from Fritz Müller written 5…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin received letters from so many people and wrote so many fascinating letters himself, that it …
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 …
Arthur Mellersh
Summary
Arthur Mellersh was a midshipman (promoted to mate during the voyage) serving on the Beagle at the time when Darwin was travelling around the world. One account suggests an inauspicious start to their friendship; apparently Mellersh introduced himself…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Arthur Mellersh was a midshipman (promoted to mate during the voyage) serving on the Beagle at …
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 …
Syms Covington
Summary
When Charles Darwin embarked on the Beagle voyage in 1831, Syms Covington was ‘fiddler & boy to Poop-cabin’. Covington kept an illustrated journal of his observations and experiences on the voyage, noting wildlife, landscapes, buildings and people and,…
Matches: 1 hits
- … When Charles Darwin embarked on the Beagle voyage in 1831, Syms Covington was ‘ fiddler & boy …
The evolution of honeycomb
Summary
Honeycombs are natural engineering marvels, using the least possible amount of wax to provide the greatest amount of storage space, with the greatest possible structural stability. Darwin recognised that explaining the evolution of the honey-bee’s comb…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Honey-bees construct wax combs inside their nests. The combs are made of hexagonal prisms – cells …
Darwin's bad days
Summary
Despite being a prolific worker who had many successes with his scientific theorising and experimenting, even Darwin had some bad days. These times when nothing appeared to be going right are well illustrated by the following quotations from his letters:
Matches: 1 hits
- … Despite being a prolific worker who had many successes with his scientific theorising and …
Fritz Müller
Summary
Fritz Müller, a German who spent most of his life in political exile in Brazil, described Darwin as his second father, and Darwin's son, Francis, wrote that, although they never met 'the correspondence with Müller, which continued to the close of…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Francis Darwin, in Life and letters of Charles Darwin , wrote of Fritz Müller They …
