Ɛpsilon

To John Richardson   4 November [1851]1

Down Farnboro’ Kent

Novr. 4th.

My dear Sir John

I have received the Cirripedes all safely, & am very much obliged for your kindness.—2

They shall in a few weeks be returned with their names.— They will be valuable to me, as giving Ranges.—3 I am ashamed to trouble you, but will you kindly sometime tell me (if you can) where “Assistance Bay” [1 word illeg] [whence] Mr Sutherland’s specimens come.—4 I can find no such place in my Gazeteer.— The species [2 lines illeg]

incomplete

1
The year is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter to John Richardson, 30 December [1851] (this volume, Supplement), and by the reference to Peter Cormack Sutherland’s specimens, which he brought back from his Arctic expedition in 1851 (see Sutherland 1852).
2
CD thanked Richardson for specimens and information in Living Cirripedia (1851), p. 10. Richardson returned from a search for John Franklin’s ill-fated expedition in 1849 (ODNB).
3
In Living Cirripedia (1854), CD referred to Richardson’s specimens of Cirripedia to demonstrate the habitat range of Balanus porcatus (p. 258); he referred to specimens found by Sutherland to show the range of B. crenatus (p. 261), B. porcatus (p. 257), and B. balanoides (p. 272). Balanus porcatus is now B. balanus; B. balanoides is now Semibalanus balanoides.
4
Assistance Bay is off Barrow Straight, Nunavut, Canada. Sutherland made collections there of zoological, botanical, and geological specimens (Sutherland 1852, 2: 284).

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-1267F,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-1267F