To Fritz Müller   21 June 1881

Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | (Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.) [Glenridding House, Patterdale.]

June 21. 1881—

My dear Sir

I shd. be much obliged, if you could without much trouble send me seeds of any Heterostyled herbaceous plant (i.e. a species which would flower soon), as it would be easy work for me to raise some illegitimate seedlings, to test their degree of infertility.— The plant ought not to have very small flowers.— I hope that you received the copies of “Nature” with extracts from your interesting letters, & I was glad to see a notice in Kosmos on Phyllanthus.—1 I am writing this note away from my home, but before I left I had the satisfaction of seeing Phyllanthus sleeping.2 Some of the seeds which you so kindly sent me would not germinate or had not then germinated.3

I received a letter yesterday from Dr. Breitenbach at Porto Alegre, & he tells me that you lost many of your books in the devastating flood from which you suffered.—4 Forgive me, but why should you not order through your brother Hermann books &c to the amount of 100£ & I would send a cheque to him, as soon as I heard the exact amount?5 This would be no inconvenience to me: on the contrary it would be a honour & lasting pleasure to me to have aided you in your invaluable scientific work to this small & trifling extent.—

Believe me always with the highest respect. | Yours very sincerely | Charles Darwin

1
CD had sent two letters to Nature summarising some of Müller’s observations on plant movements (see letters to Nature, 22 February [1881] and 14 April [1881]). In a short article in Kosmos, ‘Verirrte Blätter’ (Stray leaves; F. Müller 1881b), Müller described and figured the movement of leaves of a plant of an unnamed species of Phyllanthus (the genus of leaf flower) growing in his garden.
2
CD had asked for plants of Phyllanthus niruri (gale of the wind) from William Turner Thiselton-Dyer in 1879 (see Correspondence vol. 27, letter to W. T. Thiselton-Dyer, 24 March 1879). At night, the leaves drop and twist so that the lower (abaxial) surfaces turn outwards. CD had described this movement, based on observations of Wilhelm Pfeffer in Pfeffer 1875, in Movement in plants, p. 388.
3
Müller had enclosed seeds of some Phyllanthus with his letter of 9 January 1881.
5
Hermann Müller had told CD that most of Fritz’s books and equipment had been saved (Correspondence vol. 28, letter from Hermann Müller, 30 November 1880).

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

0.1 (Railway … S.E.R.)] parentheses added
1.2 as it] ‘it’ after del ‘I’
1.6 note] interl
1.8 sent me] ‘me’ interl
2.5 contrary it] ‘it’ after del ‘I’
2.6 lasting] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13212,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13212