To J. D. Hooker   4 December [1857]1

Down Bromley Kent

Dec. 4th

My dear Hooker

I send off this day D. C.2 & the 2 pamphlets, for which very many thanks. I was particularly glad to have seen Thuret.—3 I enclose the results of D. C. which, of course, I do not wish returned; but I shd. be very glad of your opinion on two points therein specified, whenever you have a little leisure, which probably will not be soon.—4 I have to beg one other favour; viz name of any intelligent Curator (& permission to use your or Sir William’s name as introduction) of any Botanic Garden in hot or hottish & dryish country, as Sydney or Cape of G. Hope, that I may enquire about temperate plants withstanding dryish heat, for my Glacial Chapter.5 I know you once gave me reference to some remark of your own on tropical or temperate plants ascending or descending more on dry or damp mountains; but thinking it would never concern me, I did not keep it.

I shd. be very glad to hear sometime how Henslow & all the Family are after their dreadful loss.6 Pray give my very kind remembrances & sympathy to Mrs Hooker;7 but perhaps she is yet at Hitcham, & indeed I do not know whether you are at Kew.—

My dear Hooker | Yours most truly | C. Darwin

The Parcel shall be paid to London.—

I hope you expressed my most sincere sympathy to poor dear Henslow.

Thank you very much for note just received telling me all I wanted to know about the Henslows—8 Thanks.—

1
The year is given by the reference to Harriet Henslow, who died on 20 November 1857.
2
Candolle and Candolle 1824–73.
3
Thuret 1854–5. CD cited this work in his chapter on hybridism, where he wrote: ‘Mr. Thuret has shown that Fucus serratus could quite easily be fertilised by F. vesiculosus, whereas he never once could effect, after repeated trials, the reciprocal cross.’ (Natural selection, p. 413).
4
See letter from J. D. Hooker, [6 December 1857]. The final results of CD’s calculations derived from volumes of Candolle and Candolle 1824–73 are given in Table III of Natural selection, pp. 153–4.
5
See letter from J. D. Hooker, [6 December 1857], and letter to F. J. H. von Mueller, 8 December [1857].

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

1.1 day] interl
1.7 Garden] interl
1.7 or hottish] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-2180,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-2180