To Albany Hancock 25 May [1856]
Summary
Wants accurate information on "the economy of nature". Is interested in how far the struggle with other species checks the northern range of any species.
Thanks John Storey for information.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Albany Hancock |
Date: | 25 May [1856] |
Classmark: | J. Hancock 1886, pp. 277–8 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1332 |
To C. J. F. Bunbury [before 9 May 1856]
Summary
Adds comments to a list of Cape of Good Hope plants which are also European and gives some additions to the list [see Natural selection, p. 552].
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Charles James Fox Bunbury, 8th baronet |
Date: | [before 9 May 1856] |
Classmark: | DAR 73: 159 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1617 |
To Miss Holland [May 1856]
Summary
An entomologist who has been staying with CD [T. V. Wollaston] says the pupa she sent would turn into a lackey moth.
Adds that the great destruction of birds in the winter preceding the last is probable cause of survival of caterpillars and resulting numerous cocoons.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Miss Holland |
Date: | [May 1856] |
Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1861 |
From Charles Lyell 1–2 May 1856
Summary
Urges CD to publish his theory with small part of data.
Corrects names of land shells on list of shells picked up at Down.
Discusses transport of Ancylus from one river-bed to another by water-beetle.
"I hear that when you & Hooker & Huxley & Wollaston got together you made light of all Species & grew more & more unorthodox."
Mentions discussion of old Atlantis by Oswald Heer.
Comments on Helix and Nanina.
Mentions beetle discovered with small bag of eggs of water-spider under wing.
Madeira evidence favours single species birth-place theory.
Author: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 1–2 May 1856 |
Classmark: | DAR 205.3: 282 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1862 |
To Asa Gray 2 May [1856]
Summary
Suggests affinities of the U. S. flora that he considers would be worth investigating. Wants to know the ranges of species in large and small genera.
Questions AG on naturalised plants; whether any are social in U. S. which are not so elsewhere and how variable they are compared with indigenous species. Would like to know of any differences in the variability of species at different points of their ranges and also the physical states of plants at the extremes of their ranges.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Asa Gray |
Date: | 2 May [1856] |
Classmark: | Archives of the Gray Herbarium, Harvard University (4) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1863 |
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 |
From Laurence Edmondston [before 3 May 1856]
Summary
The vaunted fidelity of the ark bird has its exceptions.
Gives some details on wild pigeons.
Answers in the affirmative CD’s query about drifted trees.
Author: | Laurence Edmondston |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | [before 3 May 1856] |
Classmark: | DAR 205.2: 229 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1865 |
To Charles Lyell 3 May [1856]
Summary
Discusses possibility of publishing a sketch of his views.
Comments on CL’s letter [1862].
Mentions various geological topics.
Asks to borrow publication by Heer.
Mentions flight of Colymbetes over ocean.
Recalls visit by Wollaston.
Notes views of Hooker and Huxley on species.
Mentions ability of ducks to transport plant seeds.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
Date: | 3 May [1856] |
Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.127) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1866 |
To Laurence Edmondston 3 May [1856]
Summary
Thanks for reply to queries.
Requests that a wild rock-pigeon be sent. Have they been domesticated as William Macgillivray says [History of British birds (1837) 1: 275–84; see also Variation 1: 185n.]?
Is rabbit wild in Shetlands?
LE’s information on drifted trees adds an archipelago to his list.
Requests information on variation in domesticated Shetland animals;
bones of large quadrupeds in peat.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Laurence Edmondston |
Date: | 3 May [1856] |
Classmark: | L. D. Edmondston (private collection) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1867 |
To T. H. Huxley 4 May [1856]
Summary
It seems improper that his advances to G. B. Sowerby Jr for payment of engravings should not have been mentioned to Council of Ray Society. His appreciation of the Society.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Thomas Henry Huxley |
Date: | 4 May [1856] |
Classmark: | Imperial College of Science, Technology, and Medicine Archives (Huxley 5: 35) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1868 |
From J. D. Hooker 7 May 1856
Summary
Non-endemic Ascension Island plants brought by man, not wind-transported.
Bentham has found intermediates between oxlip and cowslip in Herefordshire.
JDH finds quantity of albumen in seeds is not variable within a species.
Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 7 May 1856 |
Classmark: | DAR 100: 94–5 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1869 |
To J. D. Hooker 9 May [1856]
Summary
Lyell urges CD to publish a sketch of species theory; CD asks JDH’s opinion on best course.
Concerned about opposition, particularly by Owen, to Huxley’s admission to Athenaeum.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | 9 May [1856] |
Classmark: | DAR 114: 161 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1870 |
To E. W. V. Harcourt 9 May [1856]
Summary
Has seen EWVH’s list of the birds of Madeira, and would like to know more about the ‘occasional visitants’.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Edward William Vernon Harcourt |
Date: | 9 May [1856] |
Classmark: | Bodleian Libraries, Oxford (MS. Harcourt dep. adds. 346, fols. 248–9) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1870F |
To C. J. F. Bunbury 9 May [1856]
Summary
On geographical dispersal of plants. Would be interested in CJFB’s views on representative species and on his hypothesis of a mundane cold period, which CD cannot prove geologically, but thinks, if it explains many facts of geographical distribution, may be admitted as probable. Hooker and Alphonse de Candolle do not agree with him.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Charles James Fox Bunbury, 8th baronet |
Date: | 9 May [1856] |
Classmark: | Suffolk Record Office, Bury St Edmunds (Bunbury Family Papers E18/700/1/9/6) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1871 |
To Henry Ambrose Oldfield 10 May [1856]
Summary
Asks HAO about breeds of Tibetan dogs and other domesticated animals.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Henry Ambrose Oldfield |
Date: | 10 May [1856] |
Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.128) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1872 |
To W. B. Tegetmeier 11 May [1856]
Summary
Thanks WBT for help with pigeons and poultry.
Will probably be away at the time of Anerley show.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | William Bernhard Tegetmeier |
Date: | 11 May [1856] |
Classmark: | Archives of the New York Botanical Garden (Charles Finney Cox Collection) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1873 |
To J. D. Hooker 11 May [1856]
Summary
CD is unsure about JDH’s recommendation that he publish a separate "Preliminary Essay". It is unphilosophical to publish without full details.
CD will work for Huxley’s admission to Athenaeum.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | 11 May [1856] |
Classmark: | DAR 114: 162 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1874 |
To S. P. Woodward 15 May [1856]
Summary
Thanks for Supplement to SPW’s Manual of the Mollusca [1851–6]. Praises SPW’s work. "What an amount of labour is condensed in your little volume! … I fully believe & hope that you will reap the only reward worth having, the consciousness that you have done good service to the cause of Science."
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Samuel Pickworth Woodward |
Date: | 15 May [1856] |
Classmark: | Sotheby’s (dealers) (21 March 1966) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1875 |
To J. D. Hooker 21 [May 1856]
Summary
Huxley’s "vehement" [Royal Institution?] Lectures make it difficult to propose him for Athenaeum.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | 21 [May 1856] |
Classmark: | DAR 114: 163 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1876 |
To J. W. Lubbock 27 May [1856]
Summary
Asks JWL to use his influence to forward the appointment of T. H. Huxley to the Examinership in Physiology and Comparative Anatomy at University of London. Gives details of THH’s qualifications.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | John William Lubbock, 3d baronet |
Date: | 27 May [1856] |
Classmark: | The Royal Society (LUB: D23) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1877 |
letter | (24) |
Darwin, C. R. | (19) |
Edmondston, Laurence | (1) |
Harcourt, E. W. V. | (1) |
Hooker, J. D. | (1) |
Lyell, Charles | (1) |
Darwin, C. R. | (5) |
Hooker, J. D. | (3) |
Bunbury, C. J. F. | (2) |
Huxley, T. H. | (2) |
Tegetmeier, W. B. | (2) |
Darwin, C. R. | (24) |
Hooker, J. D. | (4) |
Woodward, S. P. | (3) |
Bunbury, C. J. F. | (2) |
Edmondston, Laurence | (2) |