JT’s tube [of boiled infusion] dated 16 Oct was clear on 19th; on the 20th it was muddy and contained many bacteria in living movement.
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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.
JT’s tube [of boiled infusion] dated 16 Oct was clear on 19th; on the 20th it was muddy and contained many bacteria in living movement.
Asks JT to send the tubes [of boiled infusions]. Frank Darwin will do his best. Asks for full instructions.
Sends congratulations and a teapot on the occasion of JT’s engagement.
Is pleased JT is not giving up on the spontaneous generation question. Feels strongly that subject will not be clear until it is understood how J. S. Burdon Sanderson and others succeeded in getting bacteria in infusions they had boiled for a long time.
CD has quite given up the marine theory [of Glen Roy] and has accepted glacier lakes. "Nothing makes me gnash my teeth so much as that confounded paper of mine." It is a lesson "never in science to infer one explanation is right because no other one seems possible".
Has read JT’s address ["Science and man", The Times, 2 October 1877, p. 8]. What JT says about CD honours and pleases him. JT’s short character of Faraday is beautiful.
Has observed, perhaps erroneously, that certain plants were excited to movement by a prolonged high note on the bassoon. Would now like to try a siren and asks JT to bring one from the Royal Institution.
Returns the siren; the plants "ill luck to them, are not sensitive to aerial vibrations". Is ashamed of his blunder.
Has been asked to contribute to W. K. Clifford memorial fund. Asks JT’s advice on how much the committee hopes to raise. Would like to give handsomely but feels bound "with such a lot of children, not to be extravagant".
Thanks JT for his information. Sends £50 to the W. K. Clifford memorial fund.
Sends W. K. Clifford subscription.
Has been unwell and hardly able to do anything. Has seen Andrew Clark.
CD finds JT’s discourse "grand and most interesting" [On the scientific use of the imagination (1870)]. Flattered by what JT says about him.
He is "a rash man to say a good word for Pangenesis for it has hardly a friend among naturalists".
CD is much struck with what JT says about "pondering" and delighted by his "as if" argument.
Thinks JT’s discovery of a glycerine respirator is an interesting practical discovery. CD has been wondering about the hairs in our nostrils, but doubts that JT has explained their function, since there are hardly enough.
Will ask W. Ogle to observe hairs in nostrils of different races.
Ogle will keep JT’s suggestion in mind in observing less hairy races of man and the lower animals.
Asks JT whether he can help Ogle on a troublesome point on the colour of tissues with olfactory nerves, and the relation of colour to the absorption of odours. Does JT’s respirator deprive odorous substances of their smell?
Ogle is unacquainted with JT; would be proud and pleased to call on him. CD likes what little he has seen of him.
Ogle wants very much to meet JT.
Thanks JT for his kindness to Ogle.
If the Memorial concerning Joseph Dalton Hooker’s dispute with Acton Smee Ayrton was sent to Down, there will be a delay in its return. He has discussed the matter with Mary Catherine Stanley (Lady Derby).
CD particularly wishes to see JT "On business not connected with himself" [the fund for Huxley’s holiday]. Asks whether CD may call that afternoon. GHD adds postscript saying CD very fatigued. He hopes JT can come to see CD instead, but he should not mention that GHD suggested it.
CD will write to William Spottiswoode about the fund for Huxley. CD is raising his subscription to £300. "We have done a good day’s work … [it] gives me a higher opinion of human nature than I had before, though I am not one of those who think lowly of mankind."
Sends JT the list and amounts subscribed for Huxley. It will probably amount to £1800. He will write to Huxley and use every argument he can to make him accept.