Summary

CD’s letter encourages Murray to proceed with a new edition of Variation; corrections will cost £176.

First notice has appeared in Pall Mall Gazette [7 (1868): 555].

Summary

Second issue [of Variation] is ready.

Murray thinks that the Athenæum review was written by J. E. Gray [see 5931].

Summary

JM offers a note for 400 guineas as author’s payment on sale of 1250 copies of 2d issue of Variation.

Summary

JM sends note for £420.

Asks CD to use his good offices on behalf of William Clowes’s son who is up for election to Athenaeum.

Summary

Will be glad to see Miss Wedgwood’s MS on Wesley.

The clichés of Fritz Müller’s work [Für Darwin] have arrived.

Summary

JM will send another copy of Variation to B. D. Walsh.

Summary

Lost copy of Variation sent to B. D. Walsh has been traced as far as New York.

Summary

Gives consent, which is unnecessary because term of protection has expired, for French translation of Journal of researches.

Is at a loss to know how many copies of F. Müller’s Facts and arguments for Darwin to print.

The printer is ready for copy for a new "edition" of Variation. [Presumably another issue. 2d edition did not appear until 1875.]

Summary

Has sold 400 copies of Facts and arguments for Darwin. It is a poor time for bookselling.

Last Quarterly Review has best exposition of Darwinism he has met with [A. R. Wallace, "Geological climates, and origin of species", Q. Rev. 126 (1869): 359–94].

Proposes to print 2000 copies of a new [5th] edition of Origin.

Summary

JM is about to start a new monthly literary review [the Academy]. Would like to publish in first number a short notice of the new work upon which CD is engaged [Descent].

Summary

JM advises CD regarding his relations with Masson, the French publisher of the Origin [1866], and the possibility of Reinwald’s publishing a translation of the 5th edition.

Summary

JM reports sales of Facts and arguments for Darwin, Variation, and Origin [5th ed.].

Sends best wishes for success in putting down "Parisian blasphemers".

Summary

Asks CD whether he is far enough along with his new work [Descent] to allow him to announce it as a forthcoming publication in his next quarterly list.

Summary

Financial adjustments for last edition of Origin

and a tentative title for the new work: "Descent of man and selection according to sex". [Later changed to "in relation to sex".]

Summary

JM informs CD that he will have Clowes give him written assurance that the printing [of Descent] will proceed without interruption.

The [Franco-Prussian] War is a sad damper on international science and his publishing plans.

Summary

Various arrangements concerning the publication of Descent. "It will cause men to prick up [their] ears – & to elevate their eyebrows." JM thinks he will venture to print 2500 copies.

Suggests CD tone down as possibly indelicate a passage on proportion of advances made by the two sexes in animals.

Summary

Cannot find the [indelicate] passage he referred to in last letter.

Various publication arrangements.

Summary

Sends table of sales [of Journal of researches]. 2000 copies sold since 1860.

Descent has gone to press for 2500 copies.

Summary

JM reports 1900 [advance] copies of Descent were taken at his annual sale,

and 340 copies of Origin [5th ed.] were sold.

Sheets for Dutch publisher will be sent to CD immediately. JM cautions against possibility that Dutch edition will anticipate the English.

Summary

Bound copies [of Descent] have been dispatched to CD.

Robert Cooke, JM’s cousin and partner, has been nominated for Athenaeum; asks CD’s support.

Begs CD not to permit any notice by F. P. Cobbe to appear until after next week.