Bearer brings three Porto Santo rabbits. Will ADB keep them and see whether they can be crossed with some other breed? CD believes they have become much reduced in size and modified in colour since their introduction into the island.
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The Charles Darwin Collection
The Darwin Correspondence Project is publishing letters written by and to the naturalist Charles Darwin (1809–1882). Complete transcripts of letters are being made available through the Project’s website (www.darwinproject.ac.uk) after publication in the ongoing print edition of The Correspondence of Charles Darwin (Cambridge University Press 1985–). Metadata and summaries of all known letters (c. 15,000) appear in Ɛpsilon, and the full texts of available letters can also be searched, with links to the full texts.
Bearer brings three Porto Santo rabbits. Will ADB keep them and see whether they can be crossed with some other breed? CD believes they have become much reduced in size and modified in colour since their introduction into the island.
Sends copy of Origin.
Discusses stripes on hybrid of donkey and wild ass.
Will let ADB know if lady consents to sending rabbits to [Zoological] Gardens.
Asks about gestation of Canidae.
Orders that one of CD’s Porto Santo rabbits be killed and sent to him.
Asks whether ADB has got young from mating these with females of other breeds.
Inquires about body of Porto Santo rabbit which has not arrived.
CD sends thanks for feather of the Gallus.
The rabbit arrived safely, but unfortunately the entrails had been removed; if ADB catches the other one, CD would like it sent unmutilated.
Asks ADB to perform experiment on colour perception in bower-bird.
Asks for rabbit specimens.
Asks for name of the birds that have only once obtained summer plumage.
Wishes he could persuade ADB to experiment to see whether bower-birds prefer gay colours.
Thanks ADB for Limulus.
Does Callithrix sciureus wrinkle the skin around its eyes when it screams? Do the eyes become suffused with moisture?
Offers a polydactylous cat to the Zoological Gardens. [Offer declined and letter forwarded to CD.]
CD questions ADB on the mode of feeding of geese and on the existence of variations in the structure of the bill; is trying to trace gradations in structure and habits.
Asks whether any goose sifts water with its beak.
Can ADB allow T. W. Wood to sketch one of his dogs in hostile and friendly positions?
Do elephants in the Zoological Gardens carry tails aloft when excited?