Ɛpsilon

To W. T. Thiselton-Dyer   11 August 1877

Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.

Aug 11. 1877

My dear Dyer

The plants have arrived in a very fair condition; & many thanks for them.1 Pray also thank Mr Lynch for his information about the removal of the bloom & for his trials on the logwood; all of which are very useful to me.2 We are beginning to get some gleams of light, which rejoices me, for I have been much annoyed to think that I should have given you endless trouble with no result.

I do not like that you should write to Mr Smith on the mere chance of his seeing any plants close to the seashore & protected by bloom which could be potted & sent to Orpington S.E.R., for I fear it would be giving you trouble with no good result, tho’ any such plant would be of use to me.3

Believe me yours very sincerely | Ch. Darwin

P.S. | Thirty plants of Dionæa have just arrived from Veitch so we will tackle them.4

LS

1
See letter from W. T. Thiselton-Dyer, 10 August 1877 and n. 1. CD had asked for more plants for his research on the function of bloom.
2
Richard Irwin Lynch was foreman of the propagating department at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. CD had mentioned that, in his trials on a small plant of logwood (Haematoxylum campechianum), the leaves did not move when syringed with tepid water; he asked Thiselton-Dyer whether a gardener at Kew could repeat the trial on a large tree (see letter to W. T. Thiselton-Dyer, 22 July [1877]). CD’s notes on his experiments with logwood, dated 18 to 31 July, are in DAR 66: 117–18. No letter from Lynch on his trials has been found.
3
See letter from W. T. Thiselton-Dyer, 10 August 1877. John Smith, curator of the herbarium at Kew, was staying at the seaside town of Bude in Cornwall.
4
The Veitches were a family of nurserymen with several establishments. CD had probably ordered the plants of Dionaea muscipula (Venus fly trap) from the Chelsea branch of the firm (see letter to Veitch & Sons, [before 11 August 1877]).

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-11102,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-11102