Account of the birth of Leonard Darwin, during which he administered the chloroform to Emma.
Continues the water-cure.
Has begun work on fossil cirripedes.
Showing 1–20 of 54 items
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.
Account of the birth of Leonard Darwin, during which he administered the chloroform to Emma.
Continues the water-cure.
Has begun work on fossil cirripedes.
Details of his continuing water-cure regimen.
Has heard that Louis Agassiz maintains the doctrine of several species of man "much I daresay to the comfort of the slave-holding southerners".
Homeopathy excites his wrath even more than clairvoyance.
Is concerned about the education of his boys and is undecided between Rugby and Bruce Castle schools; is inclined toward the latter, but afraid to experiment on so important a subject.
Reports on his pear-trees.
Sends condolences to WDF on the death of his father. Has brought his daughter [Anne] to J. M. Gully for the water-cure.
His favourite child, Anne, has unexpectedly died.
Obliged for letter about cirripedes attached to turtles’ backs. Genus is Chelonobia, Leach. Cirripedes do not penetrate skin, but surrounding tissue grows up around them.
Asks RB to send S. American Balanus. Already has specimens from Irish coast.
Thanks for cast and account of cirripede [Chelonobia caretta] burrowing in turtle shell. Believes base of cirripede absorbed by bone below.
Congratulates and "condoles" with WDF on a tenth child.
On education, he has not had courage to break away from "the old stereotyped stupid classical education"; has sent William to Rugby.
The first Ray Society volume [Living Cirripedia] is finished.
Has joined in a society to prosecute violators of the act against use of children in climbing chimneys.
News of his health; has been well of late, but cannot stand excitement. Hereditary weakness is another of his bugbears.
At work on cirripedes – "I hate a Barnacle as no man ever did before."
Discusses education of his sons. Would like to see more diversity.
He is pleased that Richard Owen and others had a good opinion of his first volume [on Living Cirripedia].
Discusses Rugby and education in general. The enormous proportion of time spent on classics checks interest "in anything in which reasoning & observation comes into play".
Expresses shock and sympathy on learning of the deaths in WDF’s house.
Sympathises with WDF’s tribulations.
Thanks WDF for writing so soon after his misfortunes, and again expresses sympathy.
Asks WDF to observe at what age pigeons have tail-feathers sufficiently developed to be counted.
CD is hard at work on his notes for a book with all the facts "for & versus" the immutability of species.
Asks for a young chicken and a nestling common pigeon.
Thanks WDF for his offer of assistance in collecting varieties of poultry. Describes his needs. He will raise his own pigeons.
Often doubts whether, despite all help, the problem of species will not overpower him.
Explains more clearly what he is looking for in his work on poultry: relative variation at different ages, the effect of disuse on different parts, breeding between wild and domestic, and degree of fertility of "mongrels of very diverse races".
William Yarrell has assured him that call ducks cross freely with common varieties. CD would like a seven-day duckling and an old one that dies a natural death.
CD is depressed – all his experiments are going wrong, "all nature is perverse and will not do as I wish it". Feels he is getting out of his depth.
Asks WDF to induce schoolboys to collect eggs of lizards and snakes for him. He will see whether they float and stay alive on sea-water.
He may insert his request for lizards’ eggs in Gardeners’ Chronicle.
His study of mongrel chicks is to ascertain whether the young of domestic breeds differ as much as their parents.
Has already sent a communication on means of distribution of plants by sea to Gardeners’ Chronicle [Collected papers 1: 255–8].