Outlines address to York BAAS meeting on history of geographical distribution. Organising theme: advancement in this science based on ideas enunciated by scientific voyagers. Asks CD’s advice.
Responds to JDH’s outline history of plant geography.
Considers Humboldt the "greatest scientific traveller who ever lived".
Discusses the origin and rapid radiation of angiosperms in Cretaceous period.
Comments on importance of work of Alphonse de Candolle, Saporta, Axel Blytt.
Working on York BAAS address; finds CD’s comments helpful. JDH writes detailed response and expansion.
Responds to JDH on history of plant geography.
Opinion of Humboldt.
Origin of higher phanerogams.
Importance of the occurrence of south temperate forms in the Northern Hemisphere.
Is making final preparations for his address [at York BAAS meeting] and questions CD on specific points.
Darwin remarks that "As far as I know no one ever discussed the meaning of the relation between representative species before I did & as I suppose Wallace did in his paper before the Linn. Soc. [1858].".
No one could have thought about evolution and not about representative species; yet no one discussed it fully until Origin, including von Baer.
Did not know of Leopold von Buch’s Description physique des îles Canaries [1836] when Origin was published.
"As far as I know no one ever discussed the meaning of the relation between representative species before I did & as I suppose Wallace did in his paper before the Linn. Soc. [1858]."
No summary available.
Condolences on death of CD’s brother Erasmus. Recalls first meeting CD in Erasmus’ rooms over 40 years ago.
Erasmus’ death and CD’s sentiments on death.
Praises JDH’s York address.
S. B. J. Skertchly has paralleled Axel Blytt’s work in Cambridgeshire fens.
JDH too cautious on southern glacial period.
Is Kew interested in Azores plants collected by Arruda Furtado, a local inhabitant and an evolutionist?
JDH writes to Sir William Turner Thiselton-Dyer about the meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science, which he is attending in York. He reports that John Lubbock's address was well received & that Mountstuart Elphinstone Grant-Duff is present but unwell. JDH's section of the meeting, on geography, has had some bad papers & speakers, he mentions particularly Trelawney Saunders. A polemical sermon was given at the meeting by the Bishop of Manchester, which JDH felt unnecessary as nobody had 'trodden on toes theological'. He also criticizes Osbourne Reynolds' lecture on rain & hail.
Comte de Paris requests an orchid from CD for his huge collection.
JDH responds to CD’s criticism of York address.
Arruda Furtado could work on mystery of buried cypress trunks in the Azores.
JDH informs Sir William Turner Thiselton-Dyer [WTTD] of various deliveries & correspondence received or anticipated at RBG Kew & notifies him of RBG Kew plants received elsewhere. Some Madras matting has come for John Reader Jackson [of the RBG Kew museum]. JDH has sent some things to Regel. Treub has received his case & is returning it to RBG Kew filled with Dischidia rafflesiana & Kaulfussia. Daniel Morris written, announcing the safe arrival of 2 Wardian Cases from Nancy & expressing his pleasure at the growth of Landolphias in Jamaica. Mr [Johannes Eugenius Bulow] Warming is sending dried Cycad leaves for WTTD, Cameron is sending C. circinalis from the jungles of Deecan, & Kirk a box of bulbs. Arenga saccharifera arrived in the Bahamas in good condition. The Athens Consul is sending Salvia apples from [Theodor Heinrich Hermann von] Heldreich & a footstool of stems of Ferula communis. Alfred Russel Wallace is sending some more Herbaceous plants. JDH declined to supply the Jamaica men with outfits on the behalf of the C.O. [Colonial Office?]. King's cases have arrived but only Magnolia sphenocarpa is in a fit state. Espeut is angling for RBG Kew to recommend his bananas. Henry Trimen has written complaining about his staffing problems at 'Haggalla' [Hakgala] Garden; where Clarke is ill with Typhus. Horne has sent WTTD a copy of his new book. Frederick Currey has died, he left his fungi to RBG Kew.
Comte [de Paris] will have plants next summer.
Arruda Furtado will send his mountain plants from Azores.
No summary available.
JDH writes to Sir William Turner Thiselton-Dyer [WTTD], who is in Gavernie, [France]. Since WTTD left, RBG Kew has had many visitors: the French Royal family including JDH's 'old acquaintances' the Comte de Paris & Duc de Chartres, also [George] Bentham's family & Madame Ragnal. The death of [Algernon Freeman-] Mitford's father in law in Denver, Colorado will delay Mitford coming to RBG Kew. Reports that the Palms in the Palm House have recovered after over heating. A box of Cycad leaves has arrived for WTTD from Denmark also Bangalore Cycas specimens from Cameron & 2 cases of palms from Thornton. [Ferdinand von] Mueller, whom JDH calls 'little better than a lunatic', sent some Andersonias; blue flowered Epacridaceae to be figured in the Magazine [CURTIS'S BTOANICAL MAGAZINE?] but all arrived dead. JDH summarises his correspondence with Maw regarding rock gardens. John Smith, [Kew Curator] will soon return from Cornwall, but he need not as JDH gets on well with his deputy George Nicholson & William Watson is also doing well. JDH, in agreement with Walters, has dismissed 2 lads he found messing around in the Palm House. [William] Nock has not yet turned up [at Hakgala, Sri Lanka]. [James] Zohrab has visited RBG Kew, he expects to go to St Thomas, [Danish West Indies, now the United States Virgin Islands]. JDH has not received the 'Report' & has written to Reid. JDH gathers from the newspapers that Colonel Johnston is in India. JDH hopes that Watt will go to Manipur. JDH describes what a struggle it has been for him & his father, William Jackson Hooker, to develop the RBG Kew herbarium over the last 40 years, with the British Museum [of Natural History] as an impediment. Things have improved for Henry Trimen at Hakgala Garden, [Sri Lanka], & he has received the Landolphias & Cinchonas. [Daniel] Morris also received his cases in good order. JDH is working hard in the arboretum & praises Nicholson's work there. JDH must give his list of palm genera to [George] Bentham.
Visiting his son Horace.
Studying action of carbonate of ammonia. Finds similar looking Euphorbia root cells react differently.
Intrigued by Dischidia rafflesiana, whose pitchers manufacture manure-water that nourishes adventitious roots. Does JDH know histologist for detailed study?
Julius von Wiesner’s criticism of Movement in plants "vivisects" CD in "a most courteous but awful manner" [Das Bewegungsvermögen der Pflanzen (1881)].
Pleasure in reading Earthworms.
Buying land to build a cottage.
Finishing palms for Genera plantarum after three years’ work.
On plants CD requested.
Frank should work on Dischidia.
Work on palms.
Overloaded with reading.
