To James Torbitt 14 April 1876
Down,
Apr. 14, 1876.
My dear Sir,
Prof. Ansted’s letter which I return, is a very good one.1 The more I reflect on your scheme the more I believe it is the one plan for succeeding in getting a sound variety.2
During the last 10 years I have been experimenting on crossing plants and shall publish the results in the autumn. The flowers of the genus Solanum do not produce nectar and are but little visited by insects, tho’ I have seen some on the flowers of the potato. Nevertheless they probably do not get intercrossed so much as the flowers of most other plants.3 Therefore I would strongly advise you to intercross any two varieties, (and the more they differ in all respects the better) that is if you can get two varieties which are moderately free of the pest. I know that there is the strongest probability that seedlings raised from a cross of this kind would not only grow more vigorously, but would possess greater constitutional vigour, so as to be less liable to disease of all kind and death.
Hoping that you may be successful | I remain, my dear Sir | Yours faithfully | Ch. Darwin.
[Enclosure]
“Athenenæum Club, London,
10th April, 1876.
Dear Sir—
… … …
I have long felt, with you, that the continued repetition of the individual by buds, at least in plants which have the reproductive organs in different individuals, is a very undesirable thing. … . . With regard to the potato and the vine, I can well imagine that the attacks of disease by fungoid growths are greatly facilitated by constitutional weakness, incident to a constant multiplication of tubers, cuttings, or grafts. … I have read your essay with great interest. … Natural selection of the strongest, by natural destruction of the weakest, is supported by experience and common sense. … . If I can help you with any experiments I shall be very glad. …
Yours very faithfully, | D. T. Ansted.”
Footnotes
Bibliography
Cross and self fertilisation: The effects of cross and self fertilisation in the vegetable kingdom. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1876.
Freeman, Richard Broke. 1977. The works of Charles Darwin: an annotated bibliographical handlist. 2d edition. Folkestone, Kent: William Dawson & Sons. Hamden, Conn.: Archon Books, Shoe String Press.
Sprengel, Christian Konrad. 1793. Das entdeckte Geheimniss der Natur im Bau und in der Befruchtung der Blumen. Berlin: Friedrich Vieweg.
Torbitt, James. 1876. Cras credemus. A treatise on the cultivation of the potato from the seed, having for proposed results the extinction of the disease, and a yield of thirty, forty or more tons of tubers per statute acre. (Sent, accompanied by a packet of seed, to each member of the House of Lords; each member of the House of Commons; and the principal landlords of Ulster.) Belfast: printed by Alexander Mayne.
Summary
Gives advice on breeding of blight-resistant potatoes.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-10451
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- James Torbitt
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 148: 93; Belfast News-Letter, 22 April 1876, p. 2
- Physical description
- C 1p encl
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 10451,” accessed on 23 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-10451.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 24