Ɛpsilon

To H. H. Higgins   18 August [1880]1

Cambridge

August 18th

Dear Sir

On my return home, I shall no doubt find your essay on Nassa, & which from what you say I have no doubt that I shall find very interesting.2

With respect to Cirripedes I gave to the late or present Mr Sowerby a large collection of Duplicates, as after making the British Museum collection as perfect as I could, I had no further use for the Duplicates, & it is probable that these may have been transferred to Mr. Taylor’s collection. If this is the case I shall be heartily glad that they have got into such good hands.—3

I remain | Dear Sir | Yours faithfully | Charles Darwin

1
The year is established by the address; CD was in Cambridge from 14 to 19 August (CD’s ‘Journal’ (Appendix II)).
2
The letter from Higgins on Nassa, a genus of sea snails, has not been found. The essay on Nassa is probably Marrat 1880; a copy is in the Darwin Pamphlet Collection–CUL. It was published in the Proceedings of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Liverpool, of which Higgins was vice-president.
3
CD had given duplicates of his Cirripedia type-specimens to George Brettingham Sowerby Jr; these were later transferred to John Ellor Taylor’s conchological collection in Norwich, and then purchased by Higgins for the Liverpool Museum. When Higgins examined the specimens, he noted their close agreement with species described and figured in CD’s monographs Living Cirripedia (1851) and Living Cirripedia (1854), and concluded that the specimens must have belonged to CD. See Proceedings of the Literary and Philosophical Society of Liverpool 35 (1881): xlv–xlvi.

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

0.1 Cambridge] above del ‘Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.’

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-12691,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-12691