To J. D. Hooker   3 October [1865]

Down.

Oct 3d

My dear Hooker

As you asked about the Reader I have thought that you wd like to see the enclosed letter which please return some time1   When you feel strong enough to read a moderately long letter accompanied with beautiful drawings by Fritz Müller in Brazil on certain climbing plants I shall beg you to read it, for I am in utter perplexity whether it is worth communicating to Linn. Soc.2 The chief point of interest is, it describes a sub-division of which I saw no instances namely branches being converted into tendrils, but there is of course no sort of hurry. I feel that I am not botanist enough to judge whether it is worth communicating.

Before very long let us hear how you go on. yours very affectionately | C. Darwin

LS

Endorsement: ‘1865’

1
CD enclosed the letter from A. R. Wallace, 2 October 1865, in which Wallace confirmed that the Reader had been sold to a member of the Anthropological Society of London (see letter from J. D. Hooker, 6 October 1865; see also letter from F. H. Hooker, 6 September [1865] and n. 7).
2
CD refers to the letter from Fritz Müller of 31 August 1865, which he had recently received (see letter to Fritz Müller, 17 October [1865] and n. 1). Eventually, CD sent part of that letter to the Linnean Society, along with extracts from two other letters from Müller (see letter from Fritz Müller, [12 and 31 August, and 10 October 1865] and n. 1). For more on the nature of the correspondence between CD and Müller, see the letter from Fritz Müller, 12 August 1865, nn. 1 and 11. The article included a plate by Müller illustrating three figures of branch-tendrils (see p. 217), but Müller’s original drawings have not been found.

Please cite as “DCP-LETT-4907,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-4907