Last page of a letter with a five-line P.S. concerning pen-holders.
Showing 1–20 of 378 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.
Last page of a letter with a five-line P.S. concerning pen-holders.
Requests Natural History Review for 1861 until further notice.
Congratulates THH on first number of Natural History Review.
THH’s article on brain ["On the zoological relations of man with the lower animals", Nat. Hist. Rev. (1861): 67–84] completely smashes Owen.
Owen’s Leeds address [Rep. BAAS (1858): xlix–cx].
In his historical sketch of opinion on species CD has picked out some sentences [by Owen] with which he will take some revenge. CD is not bold enough to come to an open quarrel.
Comments on the travels of JDH.
Genera plantarum a most worthy undertaking.
Criticisms of the Darwin–Hooker understanding of HCW’s views of convergence.
Describes how adhesive bladders enable the achenia of Pumilio argyrolepsis to attach themselves to the soil. James Drummond sent seeds to CD with a memorandum on the achenia.
Orders journal volume [Mémoires présentées par divers savans à l’Académie des Sciences 4] from librarian.
Responds to CD’s inquiries about rattlesnake.
Thanks WDF for an inkstand that keeps ink from getting muddy.
Asks if WDF can verify truth of a statement that white sows carry their young for a longer or shorter time (CD forgets which) than other colours. Presumes it is false, "but many odd peculiarities are correlated with colour".
Two letters for WED at E. A. Darwin's. G. H. Darwin has been to dentist. Please collect and pay for GHD’s skates.
CD’s opinion of minor critics and commentators on Origin.
H. C. Watson’s notion of genera converging is dismissed.
Thinks third edition of Origin should advertise "additions and corrections", for the additions are important. They will add 30 pages to the book; there will also be a short historical sketch. Asks for some copies for friends.
Also curious to know how Journal of researches has sold. The new issue seemed a rash venture to him.
Orders one pint of tincture of henbane.
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.
Is glad AG will publish [pamphlet of his reviews of Origin]. Insists on bearing the costs. Encloses list of institutions and individuals to whom he would send copies.
Writes of Henrietta’s illness.
Physiological changes in Shetland ponies and seagulls resulting from change in diet.
Reports on the discovery of eyeless beetles in cellar [i.e., not caves]. How did they get there, and whence?
Identifies two dipterous species of parasites [chalcidites].
Was not able to attend to the aphids last year, but will make use of CD’s suggestions and "study as much as I can the inquiry as to species".
Quotes passage from letter from Asa Gray dealing with views of Francis Bowen on heredity and Agassiz "(foolish man)" on heredity and languages.
Sent CL the Calcutta Review [with Edward Blyth’s review of Origin, 35 (1860): 64–88].
Is obliged for WBT’s "curious case". Discusses the effects of castration on development.
Can there be any truth in account of rattlesnakes fascinating their prey? Structure of rattle complex.
Fears it will be impossible to show gradation among other snakes.
Has JW seen Robert McDonnell’s article on electrical organ in skate ["On an organ in the skate", Nat. Hist. Rev. (1861): 57–60]?
Thanks for observations on Vespidae. Particularly values such cases of variation.