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Darwin Correspondence Project

From Raphael Meldola   13 September 1877

Entomological Society | London | 11, Chandos Street, | Cavendish Square. W.

Sept. 13th. 1877

Dear Sir,

When collecting notes on the subject of “mimicry” some years ago you were so good as to forward to me for perusal a letter from Fritz Müller, written from Brazil.1 I came across a copy of the letter when looking through my notes recently & on reading it through again decided that it contained a good deal of valuable entomological observation which in my opinion ought to be permanently recorded. I am therefore induced to ask your permission to allow me to make suitable extracts from the letter & read them at the next meeting of our Society for publication in our “Proceedings”.2

Allow me to add whilst addressing you that we should at all times highly value any notes on entomological subjects which you might favour us with & doubtless a great deal of such information must come into your hands without being of immediate service in your work.

I venture to think that occasional notes backed up by your authority would do a great deal towards stimulating philosophical Entomology in this Country by enforcing upon our workers the fact that the mere descriptions of species cannot constitute a true Science. In the present state of Entomology much more is thought of discovering a synonym than of observing a natural fact. To use a simile of Prof. Tait’s—the describers of species are the hodmen handing up materials to the master-builder who arranges them in order & shows their meaning.3

With the greatest respect, | I am, dear Sir, | Yours faithfully, | R. Meldola. | 21 John St. | Bedford Row, | London, W.C.

Ch. Darwin Esq. M.A. F.R.S. &c &c.

Footnotes

Although Meldola attended the meeting of the Entomological Society of London on 3 October 1877, there is no record that he read Müller’s letter (Proceedings of the Entomological Society of London (1877): xxii–xxv). Extracts from Müller’s letter did however form the basis of a later paper by Meldola in Annals and Magazine of Natural History (Meldola 1878). For Meldola’s role in publicising Müller’s work on mimicry, see Travis 2010.
A hodman is a bricklayer’s labourer. Peter Guthrie Tait likened the role of mathematicians in the understanding of natural phenomena to that of skilled builders, with naturalists and others as the ‘hodmen’ providing the raw materials (P. G. Tait 1876, p. 348).

Bibliography

Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.

Meldola, Raphael. 1878. Entomological notes bearing on evolution. Annals and Magazine of Natural History 5th ser. 1: 155–61.

Tait, Peter Guthrie. 1876. Lectures on some recent advances in physical science with a special lecture on force. 2d edition. London: Macmillan and Co.

Travis, Anthony S. 2010. Raphael Meldola and the nineteenth-century neo-Darwinians. Journal for General Philosophy of Science/Zeitschrift für allgemeine Wissenschaftstheorie 41: 143–72.

Summary

Has reread copy of Fritz Müller’s letter that CD sent some time ago and would like to publish the entomological observations in it.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-11135
From
Raphael Meldola
To
Charles Robert Darwin
Sent from
Entomological Society
Source of text
DAR 171: 122
Physical description
ALS 3pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 11135,” accessed on 28 March 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-11135.xml

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