To Albany Hancock [31 March or 7 April 1850]1
Down Farnborough Kent
Sunday
My dear Sir
I send one line to beg you to keep my M.S. as long as ever you like.2 I guessed why you did not write; it was wholly unimportant. I am sorry for the smash; & sorrier the species do not turn out more interesting: it is, however, as you say curious about the Ranges.—3 The Balanus sent (for which many thanks) is the common B. cranchii4 of Brit. Authors; I have never seen it from north of Tenby in S. Wales— I will return it hereafter, if required.— I shd be very glad to see the Greenland Balanus;5 please state when sent whether to be returned; you know I must disarticulate a specimen for examination.
Have you several specimens of the Madeira little pedunc: cirripede (which I named Machairis & have now changed into Oxynaspis)6 & if so, & wd lend or give me one for disarticulation, I shd be very glad, as my specimens are all in utter state of decay & several points of dryed animal remain unexamined by me.— (I have this genus fossil from Chalk.) I mean now to continue at Systematic Part till I have finished,—a period which will arrive, Heaven only knows when.—
Many thanks for your letter In Haste | Yours truly | C. Darwin
Footnotes
Bibliography
Living Cirripedia (1851): A monograph of the sub-class Cirripedia, with figures of all the species. The Lepadidæ; or, pedunculated cirripedes. By Charles Darwin. London: Ray Society. 1851.
Living Cirripedia (1854): A monograph of the sub-class Cirripedia, with figures of all the species. The Balanidæ (or sessile cirripedes); the Verrucidæ, etc. By Charles Darwin. London: Ray Society. 1854.
Summary
AH may keep CD’s MS as long as he likes.
Comments on various cirripede species. "I mean now to continue at Systematic Part till I have finished."
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-1316
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Albany Hancock
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- The New York Public Library. Astor, Lenox and Tilden Foundations. The Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature.
- Physical description
- ALS 4pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 1316,” accessed on 18 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-1316.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 4