WCP5314

Letter (WCP5314.5858)

[1]1

Sunday2

Down

My dear Hooker.3

The last few weeks have been bad ones with excessive vomiting, but I am now better again somewhat. — So poor old Boott4 is gone: I never knew him much; but his kindly nature excited love from the first sight. —

Emma5 has written a few lines to Mrs. Boott6 — Do you know her maiden name: I suspect she is grandaughter of Dr. Darwin7 of Zoonom[ia].,8 who had some illegitimate daughters, who were brought up like ladies.9 —

[2] Your article in N[atural]. H[istory]. Review10 has been read to me: as usual you honour me. — I have been much interested by it; partly because about a year ago I speculated, (after reading about the habits of European weeds in U[nited]. States),11 just like you, that our agragrian12 [sic] weeds have become habituated & fitted for cultivated ground, And secondly because I have been intending to suggest [3] to you to try & get from N[ew]. Zealand, seeds of those few European plants, which are indigenous there, & have been subsequently introduced; & compare the plants grown raised in this country from such seeds with our true indigenous species; so as accurately see what differences there are.13

Tuesday14

Charles had a bad attack of sickness yesterday & he is not able to write himself today but he wishes me to tell you that he has a paper from [4] Mr John Scott15 of the Edin[burgh]. Botan[ical]. Garden on Dimorphism with quite original observations & he will communicate it to the Linn[ean]. Soc[iety].16 & he begs if you sh[oul]d hear it read & hear any favourable mention made about it that you would let Ch[arles]. know as Mr Scott has taken immense trouble & is very diffident & low spirited about himself & C[harles]. w[ould]d be very glad to tell him any thing to encourage him.17

C[harles]. w[ould]d like very much to know what you think of Herbert Spencer18 as he cannot appreciate him. He has heard from Mr Wallace with the highest praise of him especially the Social Statics.19 Do you know them[?]

[5]20 yours very truly | E. D [initials]

1
The document is numbered "216".
2
This letter has been dated to Sunday, 10 January 1864.
3
Hooker, Joseph Dalton (1817-1911). British botanist and explorer. Director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew 1865-1885. President of the Royal Society 1873-1878.
4
Boott, Francis (1792-1863). American physician and botanist who was resident in Great Britain from 1820.
5
Darwin (née Wedgwood), Emma (1808-1896). Wife and first cousin of Charles Robert Darwin.
6
Boott (née Hardcastle), Mary. Wife of Francis Boott, whom she married in 1820. She was the daughter of Lucy Hardcastle, the botanist, and John Hardcastle.
7
Darwin, Erasmus (1731-1802). British physician, author and grandfather of Charles Robert Darwin.
8
Darwin, Erasmus. 1794, 1796. Zoonomia; or, the laws of organic life. London, UK: J. Johnson.
9
Between his two marriages, Erasmus Darwin had two illegitimate daughters with Mary Parker (1753–1820) who were brought up in his household: Susanna Parker (1772–1856) and Mary Parker (1774–1859). The reason for Darwin's suspicion that Mary Boott's mother Lucy Hardcastle was a daughter of Erasmus Darwin is unknown. See https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/DCP-LETT-4389.xml
10
Hooker, J. D. 1864. Note on the replacement of species in the colonies and elsewhere. Natural History Review. 4 (13): 123-127. Hooker wrote that Darwin, in Origin 'had been the only author who had had ʺthe boldness to inquire into the rationaleʺ of the replacement of indigenous plants and animals by foreign species', and who had grappled with ‘the startling fact that plants are thus proved to be located by nature, not necessarily under the conditions best suited to their development'.
11
Probably a reference to Cooper, S. F. 1855. Journal of a naturalist in the United States. London: R. Bentley.
12
Darwin mis-spelt 'agrarian' (agricultural).
13
Darwin had discussed the spreading of European species to other continents with Johann Franz Julius von Haast (1822–1887), a German explorer and geologist who worked for a time in England and then emigrated to New Zealand in 1858. Hooker's article included quotations from von Haast's correspondence about the replacement of indigenous species.
14
Charles Darwin wrote the first section of the letter in pencil; his wife Emma wrote the second section from this point in ink on the following Tuesday [12 January 1864] and signed the letter.
15
Scott, John (1836-1880). British botanist and gardener. Previously at Chatsworth House, Derbyshire, in 1859 he became foreman of the Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh. He initiated a correspondence with Darwin in 1862 with a letter regarding the fertilisation of the orchid Acropera. Recognising Scott's skills in experimental work, and an interest in dimorphism and heredity, Darwin suggested a number of topics for him to work on and encouraged him to publish his results independently. Aided by Darwin, Scott produced a paper on the Primulaceae that was communicated by Darwin to the Linnean Society in 1864.
16
Emma Darwin refers to the manuscript of Scott, J. 1864. Observations on the Functions and Structure of the Reproductive Organs in the Primulaceae. Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society of London (Botany). 8: 78-126.
17
Hooker did not hear the paper that John Scott read at the Linnean Society (on 4 February 1864), but he relayed news of its reception later.
18
Spencer, Herbert (1820-1903). British philosopher, sociologist, and prominent classical liberal political theorist.
19
Emma Darwin refers to Spencer, H. 1851. Social Statics, or The Conditions essential to Happiness specified, and the First of them Developed London: John Chapman.Spencer uses the term "fitness" in applying his ideas of Lamarckian evolution to society. Not until his Principles of Biology (1864) did he coin the phrase "survival of the fittest", which he would later apply to economics and biology, and Darwin would use in the fifth edition of On the Origin of Species (1869).
20
Valediction and initials of Emma Darwin were written at the top left of the first page of the letter.

Editorial information

Status: Edited (but not proofed) transcription [Letter (WCP5314.5858)]

For more information about the transcriptions and metadata, see https://wallaceletters.myspecies.info/content/epsilon

Revision history

Transcribed by O'Dell, Sandra [2018-08-15] Transcription checked by Barton, Michael [2020-08-27]

Please cite as “WCP5314,” in Beccaloni, G. W. (ed.), Ɛpsilon: The Alfred Russel Wallace Collection accessed on 29 April 2024, https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/wallace/letters/WCP5314