To Nature   11 February [1874]¹

The accompanying letter, just received from Fritz Müller, in Southern Brazil, is so interesting that it appears to me well worth publishing in Nature.² His discovery of the two sexually mature forms of Termites, and of their habits, is now published in Germany;³ nevertheless few Englishmen will have as yet seen the account.

In the German paper he justly compares, as far as function is concerned, the winged males and females of the one form, and the wingless males and females of the second form, with those plants which produce flowers of two forms, serving different ends, of which so excellent an account has lately appeared in Nature by his brother, Hermann Müller.⁴

The facts, also, given by Fritz Müller with respect to the stingless bees of Brazil will surprise and interest entomologists.

Charles Darwin

Feb. 11