From:
Aleksander Jelski
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
[1860–82]
Source of text:
DAR 178: 86
Summary:
AJ, a collector, would like a few lines from CD and an autographed photograph.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Robert Scot Skirving
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
[1860?]
Source of text:
DAR 205.2: 250a
Summary:
Tells of shooting wood-pigeons that had in their crops acorns that did not grow locally.
[Fragment of letter glued to 2197.]
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Robert Scot Skirving
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
[1860?]
Source of text:
DAR 205.2: 250b
Summary:
Pigeons in Egypt alight on trees rather than on the mud hovels of the natives [see Variation 1: 181].
[Two fragments glued to 2196.]
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Hensleigh Wedgwood
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
[Jan? 1860]
Source of text:
DAR 48: 83–5
Summary:
Prepared to think world infinitely old, but not that life originated with a single cell. Questions whether geological evidence supports gradual progress in organisation. HW thought scientific opinion during Vestiges debate was against this hypothesis. Argues that presence of same senses in lower animals and vertebrates does not imply descent; assumes resemblance is due to living in same world and thus having organs for the same purposes. Wants CD to know how others may see these questions.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Bernard Peirce Brent
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
[1860?]
Source of text:
DAR 205.2: 217
Summary:
Habits of ducks when sleeping on water.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Asa Gray
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
[10 Jan 1860]
Source of text:
DAR 98 (ser. 2): 26a
Summary:
Agassiz denounces Origin as "atheistical";
AG is currently reviewing it [in Am. J. Sci. 2d ser. 29 (1860): 153–84].
Jeffries Wyman praises it, though not a convert.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
William Whewell
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
2 Jan 1860
Source of text:
DAR 98 (ser. 2): 19
Summary:
Thanks CD for the Origin. WW is not yet a convert but there is so much "of thought and of fact" in what CD has written that "it is not to be contradicted without careful selection of the ground and manner of the dissent".
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Hewett Cottrell Watson
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
[3? Jan 1860]
Source of text:
DAR 47: 135–8
Summary:
Notes by HCW on the Origin dealing especially with divergence and convergence. Believes there is some natural tendency to converge into groups in opposition to divergence generated by natural selection.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Joshua Toulmin Smith
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
6 Jan 1860
Source of text:
DAR 261.11: 32.ii (EH 88206084)
Summary:
Sends a copy of his Ventriculidae [of the Chalk (1848)]. This group, he feels, is well represented by CD’s plate of graduating species [Origin, ch. 4].
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Asa Gray
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
23 Jan 1860
Source of text:
DAR 98 (ser. 2): 22–5
Summary:
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.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles James Fox Bunbury, 8th baronet
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
30 Jan 1860
Source of text:
DAR 98 (ser. 2): 26
Summary:
On the Origin. Before expressing his disagreements, CJFB praises CD’s labour, patience, fairness, and other qualities which make the work "one of the most important that has ever appeared in Natural History". [See 2690.]
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
