Requesting two books, Lafitau 1724 and Tanner 1830.
Requesting two books, Lafitau 1724 and Tanner 1830.
Informs CD of Chauncey Wright’s death.
Thanks SN for his explanation of vines.
Discusses SN’s observation on roots secreting carbonic acid.
Working on plant physiology; has not strength to discuss difficult subject with anyone.
On fertilisation in certain orchids.
Writing article for a German newspaper on CD’s life. Requests autobiographical information.
Thinks CD’s case of twins with crooked fingers may be one from his twin study.
Agrees to write to William Ogle [about twins with crooked fingers].
Describes growth of sweetpeas for experiment.
Reports the death of Chauncey Wright: "a great blow … to the interests of sound thought and scientific inquiry throughout the country".
Asks whether the twins WO reported to CD [see 5470] were named Macrae. F. Galton has told him of a similar case with twins so named who inherited crooked little fingers from the maternal side [see Variation, 2d ed., 2: 240]. [The twins referred to by WO were actually his sisters, see 10170.]
Asks whether CD has observed that bees limit their visits to a single kind of flower on each journey from the hive, as Aristotle has said they do. What advantage would such a limitation be to the insects?
Encloses a photograph and [?].
Sends a lecture CD wished to see
and corrects himself about the twins.
Thinks JGFR should send report of coloured spots on infants’ buttocks to some ethnological society.
Will propose GJR for membership in Linnean Society.
Discusses GJR’s grafting experiments.
Thanks FG for issues of Revue [Scientifique vol. 7, containing lectures by Claude Bernard].
Ogle says twins [with crooked fingers] are his sisters.
Recommends book by M. A. Puvis [De la dégénération des variétés de végétaux (1837)].
From Galton’s "twin study" he suspects that some progenitor of WO’s had the peculiarities in question.
Has collected cases of signs of assent for a revised edition of Expression.
Suggests bees visit same species because they know how far to insert proboscis and thus save time.
Sends CD the 2d part of his travels into the Tien-shan mountains [Erforschung des Thian-Schan Gebirgs-Systems (1875)].
Has written a paper on the ranges and systematics of wild sheep and on modifications probably resulting from competition with domestic sheep, which he wishes to translate into English and would like to see appended to Variation.
Discusses sexual selection in thrushes; it apparently modifies one species into another.
Comments on Insectivorous plants.
Describes his own work on fossil flora of Eastern Siberia.
Discusses genus Ginkgo.
Reports on Schrankia aculeata in which pinna and pinnule are sensitive, but, unlike Mimosa pudica, rachis does not move.