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To Japetus Steenstrup   28 July 1881

Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | (Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.)

July 28th 1881.

My dear Sir

I have received your Essays, & I hope that you will allow me to thank you very sincerely for your kind recollection of me, ever since the old days, now long past, when you aided me in so important a manner in my work on Cirripedes.1 I have read with interest the French abstract; for hectocotylisation has always struck me with astonishment. It would, I suppose, puzzle any evolutionist to trace the steps by which the arms of the male Cephalopod have been modified.—2 How I wish that you believed in evolution, for I have always honoured your many great services in the cause of natural history, to which we have both devoted our lives in our own ways.3

I remain with the highest respect. My dear Sir | Yours very faithfully | Charles Darwin

Footnotes

1
Steenstrup probably sent two related papers (in Danish, with French abstracts) on the taxonomy of cephalopods, Steenstrup 1875 and Steenstrup 1881. He had corresponded with CD and lent him specimens for his work on cirripedes between 1850 and 1854; see Correspondence vols. 4 and 5.
2
Hectocotylisation: the structural modification of an arm of a male cephalopod to fulfil a reproductive function. CD’s offprint of Steenstrup’s paper on the subject (Steenstrup 1856) is in the Darwin Library–Down. The paper was translated into English in the Annals and Magazine of Natural History (Steenstrup 1857).
3
In Steenstrup 1881, p. 236, Steenstrup remarked ironically on how useful his observations might be to evolutionary theorists.

Bibliography

Steenstrup, Japetus. 1856. Hectocotyldannelsen hos octopodslægterne Argonauta og Tremoctopus, oplyst ved iagttagelse af lignende dannelser hos blaeksprutterne i almindelighed. Det Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes Selskabs Skrifter 5th ser. 4: 185–216.

Steenstrup, Japetus. 1857. Hectocotylus-formation in Argonauta and Tremoctopus explained by observations on similar formations in the Cephalopoda in general. Annals and Magazine of Natural History 2d ser. 20: 81–114.

Steenstrup, Japetus. 1875. Hemisepius, en ny slægt af Sepia-blæksprutternes familie, med bemærkninger om Sepia-formerne i almindelighed. Det Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes Selskabs Skrifter 5th ser. 10: 463–82.

Steenstrup, Japetus. 1881. Sepiadarium og Idiosepius to nye slægter af Sepiernes familie. Med bemærkninger om de to beslægtede former Sepioloidea D’Orb. og Spirula Lmk. Det Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes Selskabs Skrifter 6th ser. 1 (1880–5): 211–42.

Summary

Thanks JS for essays. CD read the French abstracts [of "Hemisepius", K. Dan. Vidensk. Selsk. Skr. (Naturvidensk. Math. Afd.) 5th ser. 10 (1875): 463–82, and "Sepiadarium og Idiosepius", K. Dan. Vidensk. Selsk. Skr. (Naturvidensk. Math. Afd.) 6th ser. 1 (1880–5): 211–42]. Hectocotylisation has always astonished him.

Wishes JS believed in evolution.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-13254
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
Johannes Japetus Smith (Japetus) Steenstrup
Sent from
Down
Source of text
Det Kongelige Bibliotek, Copenhagen (NKS 3460 4to)
Physical description
ALS 3pp †

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 13254,” accessed on 19 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-13254.xml

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