To J. D. Hooker   [31 December 1865]

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

Sunday Evening

My dear Hooker

I write a line to say, firstly, to say how rejoiced I am that there is a good chance of seeing you here for a Sunday:1 do keep to so good an intention— it will be a real joy to me.— Secondly to thank for for information about Karsten & the case of parthenogenesis, about which I became very curious.2 It is jolly to hear of you working in the garden & very good for mind & body.

I will explain about my so-called hybrids of Lythrum when we meet.—3

I had heard & talked with Sir H. H. & Lyell about the C. medal4 (which I knew you would not care very much about, tho’ that is no reason for your friends not wishing it most earnestly) & it was very foolish in Lyell, who, I believe originated the idea this year, speaking to you about it. If I had my way it shd. not be mooted in Council this year with so very few naturalists of any kind (deserving the name) on the Council.—5

Yours affectionately | C. Darwin

As for your thinking that you do not deserve the C. Medal, that I declare is mere insanity.—6

Endorsement: ‘Dec 31/65.’

1
See letter from J. D. Hooker, [23] December 1865. Hooker’s next recorded visit to Down was 24 March 1866 (Emma Darwin’s diary (DAR 242)).
2
CD refers to Hermann Karsten. See letter to J. D. Hooker, 22 December [1865] and n. 7, and letters from J. D. Hooker, [23] December 1865 and 24 December 1865.
4
Charles Lyell had contacted Henry Holland about nominating Hooker for the Royal Society of London’s Copley Medal in 1866. See letter from J. D. Hooker, 24 December 1865 and nn. 9 and 10. CD had met Lyell, and evidently Holland, on his visit to London in November (see letter to J. D. Hooker, 22 December [1865]).
5
For a list of the members elected to the Royal Society council for 1866, see Proceedings of the Royal Society of London 14 (1865): 513. The British Museum zoologist John Edward Gray was the only professional naturalist on the council; however, several other members had made contributions to natural history. Holland often reviewed natural historical works; Francis Galton and Paul Edmund de Strzelecki, had both gained reputations as explorers; Warington Wilkinson Smyth was a mineralogist and surveyor; and the president of the Royal Society, Edward Sabine, had been credited with a number of natural historical discoveries in his early career and was a fellow of the Linnean Society (DNB).

Manuscript Alterations and Comments

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Please cite as “DCP-LETT-4959,” in Ɛpsilon: The Charles Darwin Collection accessed on 5 June 2025, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/dcp-data/letters/DCP-LETT-4959