From Robert McLachlan 24 February 1868
Forest Hill
24th. Feby. 1868.
My Dear Sir
I am exceedingly glad that my rough notes were of some interest to you.1 Owing to a slip of the pen either you or I have made a mistake— My note about polygamy in insects referred to Phryganidae & not to Ephemeridae.2
I send the following information concerning the possibility of hybrids occurring in Phryganidae. Dr. Aug. Meyer of Münster, a young German Entomologist, placed numerous species together with an idea of testing this subject.— (Vide Stett. Ent. Zeitung. 1867 p. 155).3 He found Limnophilus politus ♂ & lunatus ♀ paired; L. striola ♂ & Anabolia nervosa ♀; L striola ♂ & lunatus ♀. L. politus ♂ & flavicornis ♀.4 From this last couple fertile eggs were obtained & young larvae produced, but they died very young. This would tend to prove that the auxilliary anal appendices which present such prima facie infallible specific characters in these insects, are not really of such vast importance after all so far as reproduction is concerned, for most of the above species have remarkably different anal parts.5
I am | Yours very faithfully | R. McLachlan
C. Darwin Esq. F.R.S.
CD annotations
Footnotes
Bibliography
Descent: The descent of man, and selection in relation to sex. By Charles Darwin. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1871.
Meyer, August. 1867. Beiträge zu einer Monographie der Phryganiden Westphalens. Entomologische Zeitung 28: 153–69.
Summary
Reports that when August Meyer confined several distinct species of Phryganeidae they coupled and produced fertile ova, indicating that some specific characters are not so important so far as reproduction is concerned [see Descent 1: 342 n. 2].
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-5924
- From
- Robert McLachlan
- To
- Charles Robert Darwin
- Sent from
- Forest Hill
- Source of text
- DAR 82: A86–7
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp †
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 5924,” accessed on 24 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-5924.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 16