From:
Hewett Cottrell Watson
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
3 Jan 1858
Source of text:
DAR 98: A19–20
Summary:
Discusses the ranges and distribution of varieties relative to the type species.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Edward Blyth
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
[8 Jan 1858]
Source of text:
DAR 98: A144–5
Summary:
Zebra-striped asses.
Markings of a Bengal jungle cock.
Refers to some of his own articles on birds in India.
Reports the arrival of the "glorious garrison of Lucknow". The "wonderful superiority of the European to the Asiatic" made the success of the insurrection inconceivable.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
John Brodie Innes
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
9 Jan [1858-9]
Source of text:
DAR 205.2: 242
Summary:
Sends record of pigeon flight from London to Antwerp. [Lord W. Lennox, Merrie England (1857), p. 185.]
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
Joseph Dalton Hooker
Date:
12 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
DAR 114: 220
Summary:
On papilionaceous flowers and CD’s theory that there are no eternal hermaphrodites. Connects this theory to absence of small-flowered legumes in New Zealand and the absence of small bees as pollinators.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
Edward William Vernon Harcourt
Date:
13 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
Bodleian Libraries, Oxford (MS. Harcourt dep. adds. 346, fols. 265–8)
Summary:
Went to the show and saw EWVH’s birds.
Thinks he will give up his pigeons at the end of the summer.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
William Darwin Fox
Date:
14 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
Christ’s College Library, Cambridge (MS 53 Fox 108)
Summary:
Asks to borrow W. C. Hewitson’s book [British oology, 2 vols. (1831–44)].
CD is searching for reliable information on slight variations in the degree of perfection of nests of the same species of birds.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
Joseph Dalton Hooker
Date:
15 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
DAR 114: 221
Summary:
CD has never doubted probability of Bering Strait land connection.
Family illness.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Joseph Dalton Hooker
To:
Charles Robert Darwin
Date:
15 Jan 1858
Source of text:
DAR 100: 120–1; L. Huxley ed. 1918, 1: 453
Summary:
Has gone over to CD’s side on the fertilisation of clover in New Zealand by bees.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
William Bernhard Tegetmeier
Date:
17 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
Archives of the New York Botanical Garden (Charles Finney Cox Collection)
Summary:
Has received Burmese fowls’ skins from Walter Elliot.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
John Stevens Henslow
Date:
25 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
DAR 93: A50–1
Summary:
Mrs Henslow’s death stirs reminiscences of happier days.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
William Benjamin Carpenter
Date:
26 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
Harris Manchester College Library, Oxford (Letter book D and Letter book D Add.)
Summary:
Asks WBC to plant some kidney beans [on Holy Island near Arran] and to see whether they are ever visited by bees. If no bees visit the island, it would be "curious" to observe what plants grow there.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
George Bentham
Date:
27 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (Bentham Correspondence, Vol. 3, Daintree–Dyer, 1830–1884, GEB/1/3: f. 676)
Summary:
Asks GB to vote for "a distant connexion of mine" at Athenaeum, and to mention this to Hooker.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project
From:
Charles Robert Darwin
To:
William Darwin Fox
Date:
31 Jan [1858]
Source of text:
Christ’s College Library, Cambridge (MS 53 Fox 109)
Summary:
Thanks WDF for information on blackbirds’ nests [see Natural selection, p. 505].
Problem of choosing from among the load of curious facts for chapter on "Instinct" [Natural selection, ch. 10; Origin, ch. 7] perplexes him.
Asks about behaviour of chicks in danger and whether crossed animals are wilder than either parent.
Contributor:
Darwin Correspondence Project