Thanks for use of CD’s collection.
Comments and queries on the botany of the Southern Hemisphere.
Looks forward to seeing CD’s Galapagos plants.
Showing 1–20 of 51 items
Thanks for use of CD’s collection.
Comments and queries on the botany of the Southern Hemisphere.
Looks forward to seeing CD’s Galapagos plants.
Henslow has sent him CD’s Galapagos plants along with Macrae’s. JDH impressed by the island endemism, which "overturns all our preconceived notions" on centres of radiation. Describes the extent, and the sharp demarcation at longitude 60° W, of the American and European Northern Hemisphere floras. CD’s plants among those he is using to do Antarctic flora. Drimys winteri shows a graded series of states down the length of the South American continent.
Remarks on geographical divisions of the flora of the Southern Hemisphere.
JDH beginning Galapagos plants. Value of studying insular floras with respect to inquiries about adaptation of species.
Island floras; relationships with mainland. Ranges of species in mundane genera.
Galapagos plants one-third done.
Thanks for information on Malden Island. Comments on its plants and their relationship to the Galapagos flora. Discusses the flora of Oceania. Gives his opinion on the extent of the uniformity in species and forms amongst South Sea Islands. Large genera are more widely diffused and have a larger proportion of species with wide ranges.
Seeks advice on expense of preparing plates [for Flora Antarctica].
Answer to CD’s query on genera and species ranges.
Comments on typical forms.
Preparing first part of Galapagos plants for printing.
Suggests there is a direct relation between temperature and abundance of plant species.
Discusses the connection between climate and vegetation. Believes that an equable climate is unfavourable to increase of species either by importation or modification of existing forms; illustrates his view with reference to particular floras. Hopes to acquire facts to support CD’s idea that isolation is important in producing new forms. Considers the floras of islands some of which do have distinctive species but others of which do not. Agrees that the wide ranges of cryptogams are a consequence of their means of dispersal. Asks for references to works on original creation and species mutability in order to get the best notions of "the (mad) theories of some men from Lamarck’s twaddle upwards".
Sends notes on Infusoria for Ehrenberg.
Comments on distribution of species in natural orders that have local distributions. Intermediate forms between species of Lycopodium.
Differences in variability of species within a single genus. Further observations on Lycopodium.
Interested in Humboldt’s river with different floras on opposite banks, and other unexplained cases of very local distributions.
Would like to visit on the weekend of 7–8 December.
Differences in floras of St Helena and Ascension.
Thanks for pleasant stay at Down.
Remarks on boulders found on southern islands.
Describes the alpine character of the Andes flora and relays information on other mountain floras.
Quotes instances of seeds that retained their vitality after being carried by ocean currents.
Sends notes on the comparative floras of New Zealand, Australia, and west coast of South America.
Encloses a copy of part of a letter from George Gardner in Ceylon concerning the European character of the mountain flora.
Thanks for CD’s comments on "sketch".
Lengthy discussion of geographical distribution and island floras.
Has been "delighted with" [Robert Chambers’] Vestiges [of creation (1844)].
Galapagos flora work goes on well.
Sends comparison of the floras of Society and Sandwich Islands.
Previous letter [missing] on Edinburgh position was ill-tempered. Friends assure him that he ought to be thankful for opportunity to try for professorship.
Reports meeting with Humboldt in Paris.
JDH recommends Augustin de Saint-Hilaire’s Leçons de botanique [1841]. Relates opinions of European botanists on migration and plant distribution.
A Tasmanian Cyttaria is same species as CD’s Fuegian fungus. Did the species originate on the beeches of Fuegia or of Tasmania?
JDH gives interpretation of Vestiges.
John McCulloch, J. F. Schouw, and Lamarck on the species question.
First part of "Galapagos flora" ["Plants of the Galapagos Archipelago", Trans. Linn. Soc. Lond. 20 (1851): 163–233] finished but not printed.
Details of distribution of Galapagos flora. Peculiarity of island floras.
Leaves for Edinburgh on Wednesday.
The translation of Humboldt’s Kosmos [Cosmos (1846–58)] is delayed.
Gives instances of peculiar genera with several good species in very small islands. Scarcity of insects on islands.
JDH cannot prove that there is much hybridising, but does not see why there should not be. "Bother variation, development & all such subjects, it is reasoning in a circle I believe after all."
Raises some points for revision of CD’s Journal of researches.
Southern island floras. "The more I ponder upon Insular Floras the less inclined I am to admit the mutation of species to any very great amount."