To J. D. Hooker 13 July [1861]
2. Hesketh Crescent | Torquay
July 13th
My dear Hooker
I am glad to hear of Worthing & I hope it will do Mrs. Hooker good.—1 I hope Harvey is better:2 I got his Review of me a day or two ago,3 from which I infer he must be convalescent: it very good & fair: but it is funny to see a man argue on the succession of animals from Noahs Deluge; as God did not then wholly destroy man, probably he did not wholly destroy the races of other animals at each geological period!4 I never expected to have a helping hand from the Old Testament.
I have no suggestions for Mr. Salvin;5 but I heartily concur about St. Martha & once before urged some collectors to visit it.6 The alpine forms would be very interesting. Just say a word to him to attend to domestic animals & plants.— By the way if he talks the language, ask him as personal favour to me to enquire a little in the wilder regions whether any of the farmers take any pains in breeding from the better animals or such as strike their fancy. But I fear such information (& I have much) would come too late for me.—
I am got profoundly interested in Orchids & think I have made out homologies of the sticky so-called gland of the pollinia, & of the rostellum to each other clearly. Veitch & Co have never even answered my letter & I much fear I shall get nothing.7 If they would but say “no”, I would write elsewhere. I much want a Cattleyea or some one of the Epidendreæ, as I have examined a Humble-Bee with the pollinia of Cattlyea attached to its back.—8 Really the contrivances in Orchids beat, I think, any animal.
I am ashamed to say that I have not read Du Chaillu;9 for I have lost the art of reading & am either idle or writing
Farewell my dear Hooker. How I wish you were at this charming place | Adios.— C. Darwin
William is dissecting & drawing like mad.—10
Footnotes
Bibliography
DNB: Dictionary of national biography. Edited by Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee. 63 vols. and 2 supplements (6 vols.). London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1912. Dictionary of national biography 1912–90. Edited by H. W. C. Davis et al. 9 vols. London: Oxford University Press. 1927–96.
Du Chaillu, Paul Belloni. 1861. Explorations & adventures in equatorial Africa; with accounts of the manners and customs of the people, and of the chace of the gorilla, crocodile, leopard, elephant, hippopotamus, and other animals. 2d edition. London: John Murray.
Harvey, William Henry. 1861. On “omne vivum ab ovo”, or, the natural evolution of organic species considered. Dublin Hospital Gazette, 15 May 1861.
Orchids: On the various contrivances by which British and foreign orchids are fertilised by insects, and on the good effects of intercrossing. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1862.
Summary
Has worked out homologies of orchids’ pollinia and rostellum.
On W. H. Harvey’s review ["The natural evolution of organic species considered", Dublin Hosp. Gaz. 8 (1861): 146–52].
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-3207
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Joseph Dalton Hooker
- Sent from
- Torquay
- Source of text
- DAR 115: 105
- Physical description
- ALS 4pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 3207,” accessed on 20 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-3207.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 9