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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.
P. T. A. Talandier wants to translate Origin into French. Talandier gave Louis Blanc as a referee. Could Mrs Cresy, who knows Blanc, find out what he thinks of Talandier?
Asks if Quatrefages has found anyone to translate Origin into French, because P. T. A. Talandier, although not a naturalist, wishes to do so.
Orders J. E. Tennent’s work on Ceylon [Sir James Emerson, afterwards Tennent, Ceylon, an account of the island, physical, historical, and topographical (1859)], and Richard Owen’s Classification and distribution of Mammalia [1859].
CD is pleased by BP’s appreciative opinion of Origin. He never intended to claim that he originated the doctrine that species have not been independently created. The only novelty in his work is the attempt to explain how species became modified and how the theory of descent explains large classes of facts. If he has taken anything from BP, he has done so unconsciously. Gives names of those he would have mentioned in any account of authors who maintained that species have not been separately created.
CD greatly admires BP’s Philosophy of creation.
To avoid possible misundertanding of his letter [2654] of that morning, CD wishes to make clear that he did not wish to imply that BP’s essay and the Vestiges of creation were in the same class. The more he thinks of it the more difficult he feels it would be to give a fair account of the authors who have maintained the modification of species. CD finds that he referred to BP’s views in the preface to his larger work [Natural selection], which was replaced by the Origin.
Gives the results of crossing experiments; some interesting and curious facts.
Thanks EC for help in finding French translator [for Origin].
Hopes readers will send information on the permanence of cross-bred plants and animals. No one doubts that cross-bred productions tend to revert in various degrees to either parent for many generations. But are there not cases of crossed breeds of sheep and pigs that breed true? CD believes occasional cross-breeding of varieties is advantageous in nature as well as under domestication. [See reply to this letter by J. O. Westwood, Gard. Chron. (1860): 122.]
Discusses P. T. A. Talandier as possible translator [of Origin].
Comments on reception of book in North America and opposition of Louis Agassiz.
Asks about reaction of Henri Milne-Edwards.
QdeB’s lectures on anthropology.
Sends copy of 2d ed. of Origin, with list of corrections.
Is at work on "fuller work" [Variation].
Thanks for mentioning J. G. Kurr on nectaries [Untersuchungen über die Bedeutung der Nektarien in den Blumen (1833)]. Requests observations on flowers with curved pistils. Finds they curve toward nectary, thus lying in path of insect.
THH’s efforts to obtain Copley Medal for CD fail. Thanks THH for kind words of sympathy.
American edition of Origin. AG’s assessment of the book’s weak and strong points. Suggests Jeffries Wyman would be a useful source of facts and hints for CD.
Has agreed to permit P. T. A. Talandier to translate the Origin.
Asks RHM to clarify his statement in Annals of Natural History, vol. 15, p. 39, about variation in the maxillae of Phalangiidae and in true spiders, and to provide information on the variation in maxillae of spiders.
Presents statement of expenses and anticipated profit of the new edition of 3000 copies [of Origin].
If an American edition of Origin is considered worth while, CD would like AG’s reviews prefixed to it.
Will use all his strength to produce first part of his three-volume big work [Variation].
The pamphlet on the origin or variation of species sent by IGS-H has not arrived. CD is eager to see it and requests precise reference. ["Cours de zoologie (mammifères et oiseaux), fait au Muséum d’histoire naturelle, en 1850", Revue et Magasin de Zoologie Pure et Appliquée 2d ser. 3: 12–20.]
Orders copy of book by Louis Agassiz [Nomenclatoris Zoologici Index Universalis (1846)].
Mentions book sent by Quatrefages de Bréau.
Measles has ben running through the house, but they are now quit of it.
Discusses plans for JSH to visit; eager to discuss Origin.