Ɛpsilon

To Wilhelm Behrens   10 November 1879

Down, | Beckenham, Kent.

Nov. 10th 1879

Dear Sir

I am much obliged for your kind & courteous note & for the present of your work on Nectaries, which I will read, but cannot do so for some time, as I must first read another book & I get on very slowly with German.—1 Your book will be particularly useful to me & my son Francis,2 as we have lately observed one little fact about nectaries & which, if it turns out true, is interesting; but we shall have to wait till next summer.

I suppose you have seen M. Bonnier’s strange book. He seems to deny that nectaries ever have been modified to insure or increase the visits of insects!3

With many thanks, I remain | Dear Sir | Yours faithfully | Ch. Darwin.

3
Gaston Bonnier’s book was on the anatomy and physiology of nectaries (Bonnier 1879a); for his view on the modification of nectaries, see ibid., pp. 30–3.

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

0.1 Kent.] before del with parentheses added ‘(Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.)’

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-12305,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-12305