Ɛpsilon

To W. A. Leighton   4 December [1862]1

Down. | Bromley. | Kent. S.E.

Dec. 4th

My dear Sir

How extremely kind you have been, but I am ashamed to think of the trouble which I have caused you. The difference in the hair is indeed striking: I see De Jonghe just alludes to the patent & [adpressed] hairs in G. Ch. 1858 p. 103.2 I grieve to find, & the more grieved after all the trouble which you have taken, that I have not knowledge enough to work out the curious fruit [text missing]

I had a Verbasum in my garden (which I now know to be a natural hybrid from V. thapsus & lychnit[i]s) & I wished to make some experiments on it; so I asked Mrs. Darwin to come & tie in thread the quite young flowers.3 To do this she had with forceps to pull off buds on each side. When I came to fertilise them, I cried out ‘Why have you chosen old flowers & the corollas are all dropped off?’ She declared she had not & tied some more & when I came I found them also all off. So I said we will make sure this time for we will pull each flower and see the corolla is firm; so we again pulled off the buds on each side & tied the thread, when lo & behold off dropped all the corollas. It is caused by the movement of the sepals.— So I came [illeg] the hair & [revisited] [illeg] & at last [illeg] Sir [J. S] Smith British [illeg] statement on [auth] [illeg] [come to same] [illeg] to V. pulverulentum [illeg] virgatum,4 which [illeg] plants  If I do not [illeg] I will rely that it [illeg] plants virgatum; for [text missing]

My dear Sir, with cordial thanks | Yours sincerely | Ch. Darwin

incomplete5

1
The date is established by the relationship between this letter, the letter to J. D. Hooker, 6 October [1862] (Correspondence vol. 10), and an experimental note of CD’s dated 21 June 1863 (DAR 108: 5; see Correspondence vol. 11, enclosure to letter from W. A. Leighton, [before 21 June 1863] and n. 5. CD discovered that the Verbascum that he mentions in this letter was a hybrid in 1862 (Correspondence vol. 10, letter to J. D. Hooker, 6 October 1862). If he had already made the experiments he mentions in his note of 21 June 1863, he would not have made the comment he makes in this letter about the movement of the sepals.
2
In an article ‘On the strawberry’ by J. De Jonghe in Gardeners’ Chronicle, 6 March 1858, p. 173, the author mentioned that different varieties of strawberry could have horizontal or ascending hairs on the leaf stalk. J. De Jonghe has not been further identified.
3
Notes in DAR 108: 2, dated 28 June and 2 July 1862, report CD’s observations regarding the dropping off of the flowers of what is described as ‘Verbascum Thapsiforma?’. Emma Darwin’s participation in the thread-tying is not mentioned. In a later note, dated 4 October 1862 (DAR 108: 3), CD described finding a dozen ‘yellow Verbascum, like lychnitis’, but sterile. He noted morphological features of the plants similar to both Verbascum thapsus (common mullein) and V. lychnitis (white mullein) and concluded the plants were natural hybrids (see also Correspondence vol, 10, letter to J. D. Hooker, 6 October [1862] and n. 14).
4
CD refers to James Edward Smith’s description of Verbascum pulverulentum (yellow hoary mullein) and V. virgatum (large-flowered mullein) in Flora Britannica (J. E. Smith 1800–4, 1: 251–2).
5
The original letter is complete and according to the sale catalogue is eight pages long. The letterhead, date, salutation, and incomplete first paragraph are transcribed from an image, as is the valediction. The second paragraph, down to ‘sepals’, is from the dealer’s transcription, though some words at the end of this section are visible in the image. The fragmentary lines at the end of the second paragraph are transcribed from a partial image.

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

2.12 plants] interl
2.12 will] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-3633F,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-3633F