From R. F. Cooke   22 October 1875

50A, Albemarle Street, London. W.

Oct. 22 1875

My dear Sir

I send you by post a copy of “Climbing Plants” for your inspection & also to inform you that we dont think we can fix the retail price at more than 6/–   The work is stereotyped & of course future reprints will not be costly—only this edition will not yield much & we dont think we could expect to pay you more than £60 for the edition.1

In regard to the “Variations” which we are also stereotyping, the same will hold good, we are printing 1250 & our idea if you approve is to fix the price at 18/–, but at present we cannot say what they will produce, as we have not the expenses yet.2

You will let me know what copies you require & also send your list for presentation copies

I hope you are keeping in good health.

Yours faithfully | Robt. Cooke

Chas. Darwin Esq

CD annotations

Top of letter: ‘(Reviews)’ pencil; ‘send all Plates of’ ink
Verso of last page: ‘Fritz Muller | Cohn Breslau | Sachs | De-Vries | Asa Gray | Hildebrand | Delpino | Hackel | [‘Kerner | Nageli | Wallace | Bennett | Huxley | Linn. soc | Royal Soc.’ del] | (V. Carus | Reinwald sent) | 4 Children ’3 ink
1
Climbing plants 2d ed. was published in November 1875, priced at 6s. (Publishers’ circular, 16 November 1875, p. 932). An entry in CD’s Account books–banking account (Down House MS) for 23 November 1875 records a payment of £63 for ‘Climbing plants’. John Murray stereotyped all of CD’s later publications, which lowered the cost of future printings since the type would not need to be reset.
2
Variation 2d ed. was published in the second half of February 1876, priced at 18s. (Publishers’ circular, 1 March 1876, p. 168); however, it carried an 1875 publication date.
3
CD’s annotations are notes for his reply to Cooke of 23 October [1875] and for the accompanying presentation list. For the names on the presentation list, see Appendix IV.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-10213,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-10213