Sends CD some notes on the habits of the "American Blight Bird" in New Zealand.
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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.
Sends CD some notes on the habits of the "American Blight Bird" in New Zealand.
Notes the differences in haemoglobin between species; this proves, to WP, that natural selection does not act only on morphological development.
Remarks on the differences and similarities in the effects of prussic acid on different groups of animals.
Questions CD on his early education and influences.
Encloses his letter to GJ [6885], which was returned.
Comments on effects of prussic acid on different individuals of the same species and other physiological research by WP.
Provides information about his studies in Edinburgh and Cambridge and qualifications he had for Beagle voyage. Describes influence of R. E. Grant and J. S. Henslow.
Invites WDF to visit.
Describes activities of his children.
Moritz Wagner is going to attack selection theory in his new book on his travels in America [Naturwissenschaftliche Reisen im tropischen Amerika (1870)].
K. G. Semper may attack CD’s theory of coral islands.
Has read the notes on Rond [Round] Island which he owes to JDH. What an enigma its flora and fauna present, especially the problem of monocotyledons! Asks JDH’s opinion.
A new book on St Helena confirms CD’s observations.
Thanks for sending him a hybrid.
Thanks JO for his The Andes and the Amazon.
Is sorry he has failed to get any information on the horse’s tooth.
Congratulations [on election to Parliament]; hopes science will not suffer because of politics.
Previously wrote inquiring about savages and suicide, but JL need not hurry to answer.
Suicide is rare among savages [see Descent 1: 94].
Forwards part of a note [by Mrs L. Agassiz] asking AG to tell CD that Agassiz has never been able to secure one of the fishes sitting on eggs.
In P.S., AG adds, "Agassiz evidently regrets having abused you in former times."
Transformism explains rudimentary organs, and teratology, which are otherwise inexplicable.
Looking forward to publication of Descent
and CD’s expected book on "Variation in nature" [see Variation 1: 4].
Describes his brother Alexander’s discovery of male of Bonellia, a striking example of dimorphism. Encloses a plate with notes on his brother’s work.
The difficulty his wife, Sofya Kovalevsky, has had as a woman in being admitted to Berlin University. Kirchow [Gustav Robert Kirchhoff], at Heidelberg, has taken an interest in her.
Asks CD to be godfather to her third child [Maud Mostyn Owen].
CD’s goddaughter, Maud, has been christened.
Responds to note about the MS [Descent] with great interest and promises to obey his instructions. [See 7124.]
Sends MS [of chs. 3 and 4, "Comparison of the mental powers of man and the lower animals", Descent] to HED for her criticism. CD fears parts are too much like a sermon; "who wd ever have thought I shd turn parson?"