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Darwin Correspondence Project

To W. B. Tegetmeier   27 July [1857]1

Down Bromley Kent

July 27th

My dear Sir

I have to thank you for two notes.— Pray never speak of obligation to me, as I am certain the balance lies quite the other way.2

I am glad you like the Barb: I shall most probably have more to offer before long.— I am sorry to hear the Jacobins are so poor; I never looked at the eyes.— Were the white Turbits or owls (I forget which they are called) good: they came from a Lady who is & ought to be a good Fancier.— Anyhow they are easily killed.—

Very sincere thanks for the offer of Gulliver’s Runt, which as you offer it so very kindly, I will gladly accept.— I shd. not kill it till next year; if you think the Hen wd. be quite full-grown by that time, she wd. do as well as the Cock, otherwise the Cock wd. be better, but you must not sacrifice the Cock if of use to you.—

With respect to the Ghondook Hen, if you really do not intend to breed from her, I shd. certainly be very glad of her for skeleton;3 & she cd. be sent to Nag’s Head,4 recently killed so as to come sweet.—

I think you had better send the Birds to the Nag’s Head. I suppose you cd get messenger to go for about 1s 6d & I cd repay you by stamps as that wd be safer & as cheap as sending up to Tottenham Ct. Road & your sending there likewise.5

My dear Sir | with thanks | Your’s very sincerely | Ch. Darwin

Footnotes

Dated by the relationship to the letter to W. B. Tegetmeier, [19 July 1857].
CD had given Tegetmeier a number of pigeons that he no longer needed for his researches (see letter to W. B. Tegetmeier, [19 July 1857]).
CD described the skull of a Ghoondook specimen in Variation 1: 265. The Ghoondooks are a sub-breed of the crested Polish fowls originally bred in Turkey.
The Nag’s Head was an inn in south London where parcels were collected every Thursday by the Down carrier, George Snow.
Tegetmeier had moved from Wood Green to Muswell Hill in 1856 (E. W. Richardson 1916, p. 47).

Bibliography

Richardson, Edmund William. 1916. A veteran naturalist; being the life and work of W. B. Tegetmeier. London: Witherby & Co.

Variation: The variation of animals and plants under domestication. By Charles Darwin. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1868.

Summary

Arrangements for delivery of pigeons and poultry to Down.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-2128
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
William Bernhard Tegetmeier
Sent from
Down
Source of text
Archives of the New York Botanical Garden (Charles Finney Cox Collection)
Physical description
ALS 4pp

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 2128,” accessed on 19 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-2128.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 6

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