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From Edward Parfitt   9 December 1881

Devon & Exeter Institution

Decr 9th. | 1881

My dear Sir

I thank you very much for you your great kindness in sending me a copy of your very interesting work, I am pleased to see that it has already reached a second edition which shows that it is thoroughly appreciated   it is written in so plain and pleasing manner that everyone can understand it.1 I have myself been working at the Natural History of Devon for many years and am publishing the results of my labours through the Devon Association, which is a British Association on a small scale, I send you one or two of my papers that you may see what is being done, I can however only expect to lay the foundation for a much fuller and elaborate work for some one else to work out, The last part published is the Ichneumonidæ a copy of which I have sent.2 The natural history of Euglena viridis I am not aware of its having been worked out before mine was published   this may interest you, I would have sent you a copy of my Annelids of Devon but I find I have not one left.3

Again thanking you very kindly | I am with great | regard yours very | truly and much obliged | Edward Parfitt

C Darwin Esq. L.L.D. F.R.S.

1
CD evidently sent a copy of the fifth thousand of the first edition of Earthworms, which had just been printed. He had added information from Parfitt (see letter from Edward Parfitt, 31 October 1881 and n. 3).
2
Parfitt was on the council of the Devonshire Association for the Advancement of Science, Literature, and Art (Report and Transactions of the Devonshire Association for the Advancement of Science, Literature, and Art 13 (1881)). His paper on the Ichneumonidae (the family of ichneumon wasps) had been read in July 1881 (Parfitt 1881); no copy of it, or any other work by him, has been found in the Darwin Archive–CUL.
3
Euglena viridis is a marine protozoan in the family Euglenidae. Parfitt’s paper ‘The natural history of Euglena viridis’ was published in 1875 (Parfitt 1875); his paper ‘The annelids of Devon’ had appeared in 1867 (Parfitt 1867).

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-13543,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-13543