To John Scott   20 [June 1863]1

Down

20th

Dear Sir

I am poorly & must be brief— I am glad to hear about your orchid paper; by all means let me have copy for Dr. Hooker.2 It would be quite worth while to show that Gregoria is dimorphic & that Cortusa has the structure of one form alone.—3 I can give you a M.S. short account of structure of pollen &c of Hottonia.—4 You will thus make a fairly complete, & anyhow sufficient, account of Primulaceæ.—5 I know nothing of the genera to which you refer.— I would make all this part brief.—

I shall be very glad if you have time to try peloric Gloxinias & Antirhinum; I have got both: I mean to try peloric on self & on common flower: & conversely with other forms; so that there will be 4 crosses.—6 I doubt whether Pelargonium worth the labour; I have tried many crosses & can get no certain result—7

Please save every capsule of the self-fertile variety of red cowslip with equal anthers & stamens; I shd. like to count the seeds in each capsule, if you do not yourself do it—8 In counting I find it safest plan to count all seeds, which are not manifestly bad; as this allows for partially unripe seed: of course it does not signify if same, as near as is possible, standard of goodness is used in all cases.—

Do not work too hard.—

Dear Sir | Yours faithfully | C. Darwin

1
The date is established by the relationship between this letter and the letter from John Scott, 16 June [1863].
2
The references are to Scott 1863a and Joseph Dalton Hooker (see letter from John Scott, 16 June [1863]).
3
See letter from John Scott, 16 June [1863] and nn. 14–16. The reference is to the paper Scott was preparing to write on the structure and functions of the reproductive organs in the Primulaceae (Scott 1864a).
4
Scott gave CD’s results in Scott 1864a, pp. 78–9. See also letter to John Scott, 2 July [1863].
6
CD had been interested in carrying out experiments on the fertility of peloric flowers for some time (see, for example, Correspondence vol. 10, letter to M. T. Masters, 8 July [1862]), and had ordered plants of peloric varieties of Gloxinia and Antirrhinum at the end of 1862 (see ibid., letter to John Scott, 19 December [1862]). See also letter to Isaac Anderson-Henry, 20 January [1863], letter to J. D. Hooker, 15 February [1863], and Appendix VI. CD’s experimental notes relating to peloric Antirrhinum majus, dated 26 June – 20 July 1863, are in DAR 51: B18–19. CD described his experiments with A. majus in Variation 2: 70–1 and 166–7.
7
CD had carried out a number of crossing experiments with the normally sterile central peloric flowers of several varieties of Pelargonium in the summer of 1862 (see Correspondence vol. 10, letter to Asa Gray, 1 July [1862], and the experimental notes in DAR 51: B4–9, B12–13). There is a further set of CD’s experimental notes on peloric Pelargoniums, dated 15 May – 20 July 1863, in DAR 51: B14–15. CD referred to his experiments on peloric Pelargoniums in Variation 2: 167.
8
See letter from John Scott, 21 May [1863]. Scott presented his results from this experiment, including a tally of the number of seeds produced, in Scott 1864a, p. 106.

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

2.1 very] interl
3.1 self-fertile] interl
3.3 not manifestly 3.4] ‘not’ interl
3.5 , as near as is possible,] interl

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-4114,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-4114