From J. D. Hooker 29 August 1881
Summary
Condolences on death of CD’s brother Erasmus. Recalls first meeting CD in Erasmus’ rooms over 40 years ago.
| Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 29 Aug 1881 |
| Classmark: | DAR 104: 166–7 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13302 |
To B. J. Sulivan 30 September [1881]
Summary
BJS’s grape case is a mystery.
CD is still able to work a little but does not expect to do much more of any interest to naturalists.
The death of his brother [E. A. Darwin] was a heavy loss.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Bartholomew James Sulivan |
| Date: | 30 Sept [1881] |
| Classmark: | Sulivan family (private collection) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13365 |
From Fritz Müller 9 and 10 August 1881
Summary
Thanks CD for his letter of 21 June [13212].
Is sending seeds of Oxalis sepium, which came from a cross between a plant with long pistils and another with pistils intermediate in length. Perhaps some of the plants that come from them will have short pistils.
FM does not know who told Dr B [Wilhelm Breitenbach] that he had lost a whole library in the flood. In fact, he lost only a few books that he had left behind thinking they were safe where they were.
Has taken the opportunity of a recent cold spell to test CD’s views on nyctitropism [night movements] in plants. Describes Pandanus and Oxalis sepium.
Has just received CD’s letter of 4 July and he is glad that his observations on the effects of rain on plants interested CD.
| Author: | Johann Friedrich Theodor (Fritz) Müller |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 9 and 10 Aug 1881 |
| Classmark: | Möller ed. 1915–21, 2: 416–17; Nature, 15 September 1881, p. 459 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13284A |
From Fritz Müller 9 January 1881
Summary
Thanks for CD’s offer of assistance after flood damage.
Comments on Movement in plants. Discusses sleep movements and paraheliotropism of Maranta and other plants.
Describes the fertilisation of figs by Hymenoptera.
| Author: | Johann Friedrich Theodor (Fritz) Müller |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 9 Jan 1881 |
| Classmark: | DAR 99: 217–20 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12996 |
From Anthony Rich 9 February 1881
Summary
Contemptuous of Samuel Butler.
Has read that Huxley will be Inspector of Fisheries.
When CD visits in spring, he will acquaint him with legalities of Worthing house.
| Author: | Anthony Rich |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 9 Feb 1881 |
| Classmark: | DAR 176: 145 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13046 |
From W. M. Hacon to Leonard Darwin 8 October 1881
Summary
On proposed sale of property to CD by Sydney Sales. [The site of the Down House hard tennis court.]
| Author: | William Mackmurdo Hacon |
| Addressee: | Leonard Darwin |
| Date: | 8 Oct 1881 |
| Classmark: | DAR 166: 31 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13379 |
To John Lubbock 6 November 1881
Summary
Supports the statements on Henry Hicks in JL’s address.
Bonney is an "objector general".
CD has always supported A. C. Ramsay.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | John Lubbock, 4th baronet and 1st Baron Avebury |
| Date: | 6 Nov 1881 |
| Classmark: | The British Library (Add MS 49645: 104–5) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13463 |
To E. B. Wilson 21 December 1881
Summary
Thanks EBW for his curious case of mimicry in Scyllaea, which parallels that observed by Albert Günther in Hippocampus.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Edmund Beecher Wilson |
| Date: | 21 Dec 1881 |
| Classmark: | A. C. Seward ed. 1909, p. 279 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13571 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … letter from E. B. Wilson, 5 December 1881 . Wilson had described a species of nudibranch mollusc that resembled the fronds of the seaweed where it lived. Hippocampus is the genus of seahorses. Albert Günther had described and figured a species of pipefish, Phyllopteryx eques (a synonym of Phycodurus eques , the leafy seadragon), in Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London ; he noted the resemblance of the fish to seaweed of a similar colour ( Günther 1865 , …
From A. G. More 28 September 1881
Summary
Writes, as a former correspondent, asking CD for a testimonial.
| Author: | Alexander Goodman More |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 28 Sept 1881 |
| Classmark: | DAR 202: 113 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-13361 |
Matches: 2 hits
- … 1865 (see Moffat ed. 1898 , pp. 134–42, 170, 173–6). From 1878, the Dublin Science and Art Museum had come under the jurisdiction of the Department of Science and Art, South Kensington, London ( Moffat ed. 1898 , p. 267). In his first letter …
- … letters of Alexander Goodman More … with selections from his zoological and botanical writings. With a preface by Frances M. More. Dublin: Hodges, Figgis, & Co. Moore, David and More, Alexander Goodman. 1866. Contributions towards a Cybele Hibernica. Dublin: Hodges, Smith & Co. More, Alexander Goodman. 1860. Outlines of the natural history of the Isle of Wight. London: Spottiswoode. More, Alexander Goodman. 1865. …
| letter | (9) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (5) |
| Darwin, Leonard | (1) |
| Lubbock, John | (1) |
| Sulivan, B. J. | (1) |
| Wilson, E. B. | (1) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (8) |
| Müller, Fritz | (2) |
| Darwin, Leonard | (1) |
| Hacon, W. M. | (1) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (1) |
Darwin in letters, 1865: Delays and disappointments
Summary
The year was marked by three deaths of personal significance to Darwin: Hugh Falconer, a friend and supporter; Robert FitzRoy, captain of the Beagle; and William Jackson Hooker, director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and father of Darwin’s friend…
Matches: 1 hits
- … In 1865, the chief work on Charles Darwin’s mind was the writing of The variation of animals and …
Darwin's notes for his physician, 1865
Summary
On 20 May 1865, Emma Darwin recorded in her diary that John Chapman, a prominent London publisher who had studied medicine in London and Paris in the early 1840s, visited Down to consult with Darwin about his ill health. In 1863 Chapman started to treat…
Matches: 1 hits
- … On 20 May 1865, Emma Darwin recorded in her diary that John Chapman, a prominent London publisher …
Prize possessions: To Henry Denny, 17 January [1865]
Summary
Between 1980 and 2018, I was honorary curator of the Alfred Denny Museum of Zoology in the University of Sheffield. One of our prize possessions was a letter from Darwin to Henry Denny, then curator and assistant secretary of the Literary and Philosophical…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Between 1980 and 2018, I was honorary curator of the Alfred Denny Museum of Zoology in the …
The Lyell–Lubbock dispute
Summary
In May 1865 a dispute arose between John Lubbock and Charles Lyell when Lubbock, in his book Prehistoric times, accused Lyell of plagiarism. The dispute caused great dismay among many of their mutual scientific friends, some of whom took immediate action…
Matches: 1 hits
- … In May 1865 a dispute arose between John Lubbock and Charles Lyell when Lubbock, in his book …
How to manage it: To J. D. Hooker, [17 June 1865]
Summary
Sometimes, what stands out in a Darwin letter is not what is in it, but what is left out or just implied because the recipient would have known what Darwin was referring to. It is frustrating to spend hours looking but fail to identify something mentioned…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Sometimes, what stands out in a Darwin letter is not what is in it, but what is left out or just …
Women’s scientific participation
Summary
Observers | Fieldwork | Experimentation | Editors and critics | Assistants Darwin’s correspondence helps bring to light a community of women who participated, often actively and routinely, in the nineteenth-century scientific community. Here is a…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Observers | Fieldwork | Experimentation | Editors and critics | Assistants …
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 …
Inheritance
Summary
It was crucial to Darwin’s theories of species change that naturally occurring variations could be inherited. But at the time when he wrote Origin, he had no explanation for how inheritance worked – it was just obvious that it did. Darwin’s attempt to…
Matches: 1 hits
- … 'Hypotheses may often be of service to science, when they involve a certain portion of …
Referencing women’s work
Summary
Darwin's correspondence shows that women made significant contributions to Darwin's work, but whether and how they were acknowledged in print involved complex considerations of social standing, professional standing, and personal preference.…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin's correspondence shows that women made significant contributions to Darwin's work, but …
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 …
3.10 Ernest Edwards, 'Men of Eminence'
Summary
< Back to Introduction In 1865 Darwin was invited to feature in another series of published photographs, Portraits of Men of Eminence in Literature, Science and Art, with Biographical Memoirs . . . The Photographs from Life by Ernest Edwards, B.A.…
Matches: 1 hits
- … < Back to Introduction In 1865 Darwin was invited to feature in another series of …
Religion
Summary
Design|Personal Belief|Beauty|The Church Perhaps the most notorious realm of controversy over evolution in Darwin's day was religion. The same can be said of the evolution controversy today; however the nature of the disputes and the manner in…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Design | Personal Belief | Beauty | The Church Perhaps the most notorious …
Fake Darwin: myths and misconceptions
Summary
Many myths have persisted about Darwin's life and work. Here are a few of the more pervasive ones, with full debunking below...
Matches: 1 hits
- … Many myths have persisted about Darwin's life and work. Here are a few of the more pervasive ones, …
Darwin in letters, 1863: Quarrels at home, honours abroad
Summary
At the start of 1863, Charles Darwin was actively working on the manuscript of The variation of animals and plants under domestication, anticipating with excitement the construction of a hothouse to accommodate his increasingly varied botanical experiments…
Matches: 1 hits
- … At the start of 1863, Charles Darwin was actively working on the manuscript of The variation of …
Evolution: Selected Letters of Charles Darwin 1860-1870
Summary
This selection of Charles Darwin’s letters includes correspondence with his friends and scientific colleagues around the world; letters by the critics who tried to stamp out his ideas, and by admirers who helped them to spread. It takes up the story of…
Matches: 1 hits
- … This selection of Charles Darwin’s letters includes correspondence with his friends and scientific …
Darwin in letters, 1874: A turbulent year
Summary
The year 1874 was one of consolidation, reflection, and turmoil for Darwin. He spent the early months working on second editions of Coral reefs and Descent of man; the rest of the year was mostly devoted to further research on insectivorous plants. A…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The year 1874 was one of consolidation, reflection, and turmoil for Darwin. He spent the early …
Darwin on race and gender
Summary
Darwin’s views on race and gender are intertwined, and mingled also with those of class. In Descent of man, he tried to explain the origin of human races, and many of the differences between the sexes, with a single theory: sexual selection. Sexual…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin’s views on race and gender are intertwined, and mingled also with those of class. In …
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 in letters, 1882: Nothing too great or too small
Summary
In 1882, Darwin reached his 74th year Earthworms had been published the previous October, and for the first time in decades he was not working on another book. He remained active in botanical research, however. Building on his recent studies in plant…
Matches: 1 hits
- … In 1882, Darwin reached his 74th year Earthworms had been published the previous October, and …
Science: A Man’s World?
Summary
Discussion Questions|Letters Darwin's correspondence show that many nineteenth-century women participated in the world of science, be it as experimenters, observers, editors, critics, producers, or consumers. Despite this, much of the…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Discussion Questions | Letters Darwin's correspondence show that many nineteenth …
