Letter 5116
Oliver, Daniel to Darwin, C. R.
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Identifies a plant.
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CD will not find Hermann Schacht's Lehrbuch [der Anatomie und Physiologie der Gewächse (1856–9)] at the Linnean Society Library.
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Transcription
Royal Gardens Kew
June 9/1866
My dear Sir/
Your plant is, I think, Anchusa italica
Schacht's `Lehrbuch' I am afraid you will not find at Linn. Soc. If you think it worth while referring to I suppose we might make an exception again to our stringent rule about lending books!
very sincerely yrs | Dl. Oliver
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- f1 5116.f1
Anchusa italica (now treated as a synonym of A. azurea) is a Mediterranean herbaceous perennial that was introduced to British gardens in the nineteenth century (Coats 1968, pp. 15--17). CD evidently enclosed a request for Oliver to identify the plant in his letter to J. D. Hooker, [4 June 1866]. - +
- f2 5116.f2
Oliver refers to the Lehrbuch der Anatomie und Physiologie der Gewächse (Textbook on the anatomy and physiology of perennials) by Hermann Schacht (Schacht 1856--9). In his chapter on pangenesis in Variation 2: 384, CD cited Schacht 1856--9, 2: 12, on `adventitious buds', which CD said might be formed `almost anywhere' in plants. - +
- f3 5116.f3
CD occasionally requested books from the library of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, when he was unable to obtain a copy from the Linnean Society (see, for example, Correspondence vol. 8, letter to J. D. Hooker, 26 November [1860]).