CD regrets the trouble RO has had about C. G. Ehrenberg’s parcel.
He is reading On the nature of limbs [1849] with uncommon interest and admires the way Owen worked out the toes.
Also has read On parthenogenesis [1849] with great interest.
No summary available.
Asks to borrow a cirripede specimen from collection of Frederick Dixon.
Discusses possibility of providing B. J. Sulivan with a vessel for fossil hunting in Patagonia.
Asks RO to ask Mrs Dixon about borrowing cirripede specimen.
No summary available.
About to go to press with "wearyful" Fossil Cirripedia [vol. 1 (1851)];
would like to borrow proof-sheets of Frederick Dixon’s work [The geology and fossils of the Tertiary and Cretaceous formations of Sussex (1850)]. Would also like to borrow a specimen of Balanus glacialis from Royal College of Surgeons. Encloses formal request [see 1356].
Asks to borrow specimen of Balanus glacialis from the Museum of the Royal College of Surgeons. It will be necessary to disarticulate it, but CD will return the valves to the Museum.
No summary available.
Gratified by what RO says about his book [Living Cirripedia, vol. 1 (1851)]. The anatomical work is the only part he is really interested in; finds the "mere systematic part infinitely tedious"; but will be surprised if he is ever proved wrong on the males of Ibla and Scalpellum.
Bartholomew James Sulivan’s address is Guildford. Please to have CD’s copy [of Owen 1853] left at the Athenaeum Club or the Geological Society of London.
He and his family are in Eastbourne but the weather has been poor.
If only one observer is assigned to Peking, observations could not be conducted. Describes staff and expenses at other magnetic observatories. Edward Sabine's plan to adapt all instruments to photographic self-registering instruments.
Discusses proposal to establish magnetic and meteorological observatories at Peking, Newfoundland, Vancouver, and Falkland.
Sends RO a note from G. B. Airy on the inadvisability of having a meteorological observatory in Peking. JH agrees with Airy. When William Whewell arrives for a visit, JH will seek his advice.
Has asked his publisher to send a copy of Origin. Fears it will be "an abomination" in RO’s eyes. Urges him to read it straight through, as it is a condensed abstract and will otherwise be unintelligible.
Sends source of description of swimming bear catching insects [Samuel Hearne, A journey from Prince of Wales’s Fort in Hudson’s Bay to the northern ocean … (1795); see Origin, p. 184].
Responds to Owen’s remarks that his book [Origin] is not likely to be true because it attempts to explain so much. CD describes how, for fear this might be so, he resolved to give up the work if he could not convince two or three competent judges. He is sensitive because of unjust things said by a distinguished friend [A. Sedgwick]. Value of his views now depends on men eminent in science.