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Darwin in letters, 1864: Failing health

Summary

On receiving a photograph from Charles Darwin, the American botanist Asa Gray wrote on 11 July 1864: ‘the venerable beard gives the look of your having suffered, and … of having grown older’.  Because of poor health, Because of poor health, Darwin…

Matches: 17 hits

  • … Darwin, the American botanist Asa Gray wrote on 11 July 1864 : ‘the venerable beard gives the …
  • … Darwin corresponded little during the first three months of 1864, dictating nearly all his letters …
  • … of the five physicians Darwin had consulted in 1863. In a letter of 26[–7] March [1864] , Darwin …
  • … and he received more letters of advice from Jenner. In a letter of 15 December [1864] to the …
  • … As Darwin explained to his cousin William Darwin Fox in a letter of 30 November [1864] , ‘the …
  • …  five years earlier. His primary botanical preoccupation in 1864 was climbing plants. He had become …
  • … observations indoors ( Correspondence  vol. 11). In a letter of [27 January 1864] , Darwin …
  • … himself as ‘a broken-down brother-naturalist’, sent to Daniel Oliver, keeper of the herbarium at the …
  • … gradation by which  leaves  produce tendrils’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, [8 February 1864] ). …
  • … fearfully for it is a leaf climber & therefore sacred’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 2 June [1864] …
  • … than modified branches or leaves as most botanists thought, Oliver initially expressed reservations. …
  • … matters which routinists regard in the light of axioms’ ( letter from Daniel Oliver, [17 March 1864
  • … long series of changes . . .’ When he told Asa Gray in a letter of 29 October [1864] that he was …
  • … addition to his work on climbing plants, Darwin engaged in 1864 in botanical observations and …
  • …  paper was published, Darwin remarked to Hooker in a letter of 26 November [1864] that nothing …
  • … of the two species with the common oxlip. In a letter of 22 October [1864] , Darwin triumphantly …
  • … the ‘splendid case of Dimorphism’ in  Menyanthes  ( letter from Emma and Charles Darwin to W. E. …

Darwin in letters, 1862: A multiplicity of experiments

Summary

1862 was a particularly productive year for Darwin. This was not only the case in his published output (two botanical papers and a book on the pollination mechanisms of orchids), but more particularly in the extent and breadth of the botanical experiments…

Matches: 22 hits

  • … but really I do think you have a good right to be so’ ( letter from J. D. Hooker, [15 and] 20 …
  • … species. Darwin attempted to dissuade him from this view ( letter to T. H. Huxley, 14 [January 1862 …
  • … partially sterile together. He failed. Huxley replied ( letter from T. H. Huxley, 20 January 1862 …
  • … and pronounced them ‘simply perfect’, but continued ( letter to T. H. Huxley, 18 December [1862] ) …
  • … resigned to their difference of opinion, but complained ( letter to T. H. Huxley, 28 December [1862 …
  • … letters, Darwin, impressed, gave him the commission ( see letter to John Scott, 11 December [1862] …
  • … protégé, telling Hooker: ‘he is no common man’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 12 [December 1862] ). …
  • … Towards the end of the year, he wrote to Hooker ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 12 [December 1862] ): …
  • … and added, ‘new cases are tumbling in almost daily’ ( letter to Asa Gray, 22 January [1862] ). In …
  • … hopeful, became increasingly frustrated, telling Hooker ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 7 March [1862] ) …
  • … on the problem: ‘the labour is great’, he told Gray ( letter to Asa Gray, 10–20 June [1862] ), ‘I …
  • … resulted from his ‘ enormous  labour over them’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 14 [October 1862] ; …
  • … result once out of four or five sets of experiments’ ( letter to M. T. Masters, 24 July [1862] ). …
  • … one species may be said to be generically distinct’ ( letter to Asa Gray, 14 July [1862] ). The …
  • … and determined to publish on  Linum  ‘at once’ ( letter to John Scott, 11 December [1862] ), …
  • … d . like to make out this wonderfully complex case—’ ( letter to Daniel Oliver, 29 [July 1862] ). …
  • … The case clearly excited Darwin, who exclaimed to Gray ( letter to Asa Gray, 9 August [1862] ), ‘I …
  • … that the case warranted a paper for the Linnean Society ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 6 October [1862] …
  • … the structure of almost every  flower’ ( letter to Daniel Oliver, 8 June [1862] ). I …
  • … to wait. ‘It is a very extraordinary  book!’, wrote Daniel Oliver on 14 May, and George Bentham …
  • … a new era in the science’ (A. Gray 1862b, p. 429). Oliver joined in the chorus, telling him: ‘Your …
  • … & most promising direction to our studies’ ( letter from Daniel Oliver, 14 May 1862 ). Darwin …

Insectivorous Plants

Summary

Sources|Discussion Questions|Experiment Plants that consume insects Darwin began his work with insectivorous plants in the mid 1860s, though his findings would not be published until 1875. In his autobiography Darwin reflected on the delay that…

Matches: 7 hits

  • … Murray. Chapters 17 and 18 Letters Letter Packet: Insectivorous Plants …
  • … Scott's objection to Natural Selection. Letter 2951 - Charles Darwin to Daniel
  • … ammonia as a substitute for flies on Drosera . Letter 2932 - Charles Darwin to J.S. …
  • … teacher during Darwin's students days at Cambridge. In this letter Darwin asks Henslow whether …
  • … the Drosera is a known or common phenomenon. Letter 8113 - Mary Treat to Charles …
  • … observations in gratitude for Darwin's own work. Letter 9005 - Charles Darwin to …
  • … of utricularia expressed by  Mary Treat  in an 1874  letter  to Charles Darwin: I …

Darwin in letters, 1865: Delays and disappointments

Summary

The year was marked by three deaths of personal significance to Darwin: Hugh Falconer, a friend and supporter; Robert FitzRoy, captain of the Beagle; and William Jackson Hooker, director of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, and father of Darwin’s friend…

Matches: 27 hits

  • … The death of Hugh Falconer Darwin’s first letter to Hooker of 1865 suggests that the family …
  • … having all the Boys at home: they make the house jolly’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 7 January [1865] …
  • … for the Copley Medal of the Royal Society of London in 1864, had staunchly supported his candidacy, …
  • … had failed to include among the grounds of the award ( see letter from Hugh Falconer to Erasmus …
  • … his letters to Darwin, and Darwin responded warmly: ‘Your letter is by far the grandest eulogium …
  • … may well rest content that I have not laboured in vain’ ( letter to Hugh Falconer, 6 January [1865] …
  • … always a most kind friend to me. So the world goes.—’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 2 February [1865] …
  • … for our griefs & pains: these alone are unalloyed’ ( letter from J. D. Hooker, 3 February 1865 …
  • … gas.— Sic transit gloria mundi, with a vengeance’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 9 February [1865] ). …
  • … added, ‘I know it is folly & nonsense to try anyone’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 7 January [1865] …
  • … ineffective, and Darwin had given it up by early July ( see letter to J. D. Hooker, [10 July 1865] …
  • … of anything, & that almost exclusively bread & meat’ ( letter to Asa Gray, 15 August [1865] …
  • … better, attributing the improvement to Jones’s diet ( see letter to T. H. Huxley, 4 October [1865] …
  • … he was ‘able to write about an hour on most days’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 22 December [1865] ). …
  • … others very forward, except the last & concluding one’ ( letter to John Murray, 31 March [1865] …
  • … my book will be ready for the press in the autumn’ ( letter to John Murray, 4 April [1865] ). In …
  • … however, ‘I am never idle when I can do anything’ ( letter to John Murray, 2 June [1865] ). It was …
  • … might be more willing to bear the expense of the woodcuts ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 7 January [1865 …
  • … & I loathe the whole subject like tartar emetic’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 19 January [1865] ) …
  • … you will be an unnatural parent, for it is your child’ ( letter to Asa Gray, 19 April 1865 ; …
  • … needed for references, probably from the Linnean Society ( letter to [Richard Kippist], 4 June …
  • … to CD’s theory of transmutation, in or before November 1864 ( Correspondence vol. 12, letter to …
  • … 1865 that he had just finished hearing it read aloud ( letter to Fritz Müller, 10 August [1865] ). …
  • … letters to the Linnean Society, Darwin enlisted the help of Daniel Oliver, a botanist at Kew, to …
  • … ), and wrote up his results on his voyage to India in late 1864, despite suffering from sea-sickness …
  • … in learned societies and in the popular press. In December 1864, George Douglas Campbell, the duke …
  • … this and that modification of structure’ (G. D. Campbell 1864, pp. 275–6). Campbell argued further …

Climbing plants

Summary

Darwin’s book Climbing plants was published in 1865, but its gestation began much earlier. The start of Darwin’s work on the topic lay in his need, owing to severe bouts of illness in himself and his family, for diversions away from his much harder book on…

Matches: 14 hits

  • … & do not find that it is known, I will perhaps write a letter to you for the  chance  of its
  • find nothing in any book which I have: neither Hooker nor Oliver knew anything of these movements ’ …
  • was incredulous. ‘As to tendrils, What are Hooker & Oliver (the latter a Professor too) …
  • The next year brought no respite. At the end of January 1864, he told Hooker, ‘ The only approach
  • climbers, this does not distress my weakened BrainAsk Oliver to look over enclosed queries (& …
  • me if botanists wd let all tendrils be modified leaves’. Daniel Oliver, for example, insisted, …
  • of my facts on climbing’, he told Hooker in late February 1864, ‘ but I could not draw up a paper
  • to write up the results of his recent work. By March 1864, Darwin was pursuing the question
  • dissecting and drawing. Darwin sent Williams drawing to Oliver, commenting, ‘ Does not this render
  • between foliar and axial parts, which, however, Oliver admitted, sometimesshades off and is lost
  • distinction. They are both axial.’ Only days later, Oliver apologised for the tone of his previous
  • steadily revolves ’. Throughout May and early June 1864, Darwin expanded his work, asking friends
  • to find that I have a good deal of new matter ’. He told Oliver that Mohl, despite his book being
  • receive new plants even as he reported at the end of August 1864, ‘ Thank Heaven I have finished

Darwin in letters, 1863: Quarrels at home, honours abroad

Summary

At the start of 1863, Charles Darwin was actively working on the manuscript of The variation of animals and plants under domestication, anticipating with excitement the construction of a hothouse to accommodate his increasingly varied botanical experiments…

Matches: 22 hits

  • … that he was ‘unwell & must write briefly’ ( letter to John Scott, 31 May [1863] ), and in a …
  • … persevered with his work on Variation until 20 July, his letter-writing dwindled considerably. The …
  • … from ‘some Quadrumanum animal’, as he put it in a letter to J. D. Hooker of 24[–5] February [1863] …
  • … ‘I declare I never in my life read anything grander’ ( letter to T. H. Huxley, 26 [February 1863] …
  • … than  Origin had (see  Correspondence  vol. 8, letter to Charles Lyell, 10 January [1860] ). …
  • … from animals like the woolly mammoth and cave bear ( see letter from Jacques Boucher de Perthes, 23 …
  • … leap from that of inferior animals made him ‘groan’ ( letter to Charles Lyell, 6 March [1863] ). …
  • … out that species were not separately created’ ( letter to Charles Lyell, 17 March [1863] ). Public …
  • … book he wished his one-time mentor had not said a word ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 24[–5] February …
  • … I respect you, as my old honoured guide & master’ ( letter to Charles Lyell, 6 March [1863] ). …
  • … against stronger statements regarding species change ( letter from Charles Lyell, 11 March 1863 ). …
  • … thinking, while Huxley’s book would scare them off ( see letter from Asa Gray, 20 April 1863 ). In …
  • … change of species by descent put him ‘into despair’ ( letter to Asa Gray, 11 May [1863] ). In the …
  • … disaffected towards Lyell and his book. In a February letter to the  Athenæum , a weekly review of …
  • … find great difficulty in answering Owen  unaided ’ ( letter from J. D. Hooker, [23 February 1863] …
  • … of so much of Lyell’s book being written by others’ ( letter from J. D. Hooker, [23 February 1863] …
  • … is wretched to see men fighting so for a little fame’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 17 March [1863] ). …
  • … overt act, and I shall watch for a fitting opportunity’ ( letter to Hugh Falconer, 5 [and 6] …
  • … God demented Owen, as a punishment for his crimes… ?’ ( letter from Hugh Falconer, 3 January [1863] …
  • … leaves, asking the professional botanists Gray, Hooker, and Daniel Oliver for references on …
  • … the family, to explaining the phenomenon ( see letter from Daniel Oliver, 17 February 1863 , …
  • … to the Linnean Society in a paper that was read in February 1864. He had already promised Scott that …

Darwin’s Photographic Portraits

Summary

Darwin was a photography enthusiast. This is evident not only in his use of photography for the study of Expression and Emotions in Man and Animal, but can be witnessed in his many photographic portraits and in the extensive portrait correspondence that…

Matches: 9 hits

  • a photograph as a token of esteem by a colleague, such as Daniel Oliver at Kew, the image became
  • to the copy he had sent five years previously in his 1860 letter to Hooker , Darwin exclaimed
  • far more satisfied with the results. In 1860-61 and again in 1864 Charles Darwin sat for his eldest
  • photographs of Darwin.The years between 1860 and 1864 took a physical and emotional toll on Darwin, …
  • and the Botany Libraries (left)  and  Charles Darwin, 1864, William Darwin, Dar 225:113, …
  • gaze. These photographs were rarely included in a Darwin letter, save for perhaps a very few close
  • taken for public consumption. Responding to  a letter from a German translatorAdolph
  • which you do me the honour to wish to possess.” As the letter and photograph had to travel from Down
  • took the first portrait with hisvenerable beardin 1864. ImageCharles Darwin, 1881, …

Forms of flowers

Summary

Darwin’s book The different forms of flowers on plants of the same species, published in 1877, investigated the structural differences in the sexual organs of flowers of the same species. It drew on and expanded five articles Darwin had published on the…

Matches: 6 hits

  • … meaning of the dimorphism ’. Two months later, he told Daniel Oliver, ‘ I am surprised to find …
  • … he had been working on since late July 1862. He told Oliver that, ‘ as each form has two sets of …
  • … a long spell of sickness, and it was only in February 1864 that he wrote up his results. ‘ The …
  • … Lythrum salicaria ’, was sent to the Society on 10 June 1864 and read six days later at the final …
  • … (p. 82) and clarified the meaning to Fritz Müller in a letter in September 1866, ‘ What I meant in …
  • … than in the short-styled form ’, Darwin annotated this letter, wondering, ‘Would it be worth while …

Darwin’s reading notebooks

Summary

In April 1838, Darwin began recording the titles of books he had read and the books he wished to read in Notebook C (Notebooks, pp. 319–28). In 1839, these lists were copied and continued in separate notebooks. The first of these reading notebooks (DAR 119…

Matches: 24 hits

  • … [Reimarius 1760] The Highlands & Western Isl ds  letter to Sir W Scott [MacCulloch 1824 …
  • … 1834–40]: In Portfolio of “abstracts” 34  —letter from Skuckard of books on Silk Worm …
  • … Dispatches [Wellesley 1834–9] Carlyles Oliver Cromwell [Carlyle 1845] (read) Keppells( …
  • … M rs  Fry’s Life [Fry 1847] Horace Walpoles letter to C t . of Ossory [Walpole 1848] …
  • … Asiatic Society ]—contains very little Macleay’s letter to D r  Fleming [Macleay 1830] …
  • … 1837–8]— read aloud April 12 th . Carlyles Oliver Cromwell [Carlyle 1845] May 5. Ray …
  • … [Heer 1854].— Hooker has it.— Very important Hookers letter Jan. 1859 Yules Ava [Yule 1858] …
  • … of the material from these portfolios is in DAR 205, the letter from William Edward Shuckard to …
  • … ( Notebooks , pp. 319–28). 55  The letter was addressed to Nicholas Aylward Vigors …
  • … to William Jackson Hooker. See  Correspondence  vol. 3, letter to J. D. Hooker, [5 or 12 November …
  • … 1855.  The senses and the intellect . London. [2d ed. (1864) in Darwin Library.]  *128: 165 …
  • … 119: 21b Broughton, William Grant. 1832.  A letter in vindication of   the principles of …
  • … . London. [Other eds.]  119: 13b ——. 1845.  Oliver Cromwell’s letters and speeches: with …
  • … 142–214.  *119: 21v.; 119: 18a Clarke, Edward Daniel. 1810–23.  Travels in various   …
  • … . 9 vols. Paris.  *128: 169 Defoe, Daniel. 1719.  The life and strange surprizing   …
  • … London.  *119: 23, 24; 128: 5 Ekmarck, Carl Daniel. 1781. On the migration of birds. In …
  • … G. H. Hodson. London.  128: 25 Hofacker, Johann Daniel. 1828.  Ueber die Eigenschaften   …
  • … Illustrated Library.) London.  *128: 157 Johnson, Daniel. 1822.  Sketches of field sports …
  • … by Bekhur to   Garoo and the Lake Manasarowara: with a letter from … J.   G. Gerard, Esq. …
  • … 1830. On the dying struggle of the dichotomous sytem. In a letter to N. A. Vigors.  Philosophical …
  • … *119: 8v., 22v.; *128: 165 ——. 1850a. Letter to the Rev. John Bachman, on the question of …
  • … art of improving the   breeds of domestic animals. In a letter addressed to the   Right Hon. Sir …
  • … *119: 4v.; 119: 13a Wilcke, Henricus Christianus Daniel. 1781. On the police of nature. In …
  • … 1820.  Remarks on the improvement of   cattle, &c. in a letter to Sir John Saunders Sebright, …

Darwin in letters, 1844–1846: Building a scientific network

Summary

The scientific results of the Beagle voyage still dominated Darwin's working life, but he broadened his continuing investigations into the nature and origin of species. Far from being a recluse, Darwin was at the heart of British scientific society,…

Matches: 8 hits

  • … Government grant was exhausted ( Correspondence  vol. 2, letter to A. Y. Spearman, 9 October 1843, …
  • … are not (it is like confessing a murder) immutable’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, [11 January 1844] ). …
  • … the essay of 1844 to read (see  Correspondence  vol. 4, letter to J. D. Hooker, 8 [February 1847]) …
  • … himself: as he told his cousin William Darwin Fox in a letter of [24 April 1845] , he felt he …
  • … Natural selection Perhaps the most interesting letter relating to Darwin’s species theory, …
  • … expertise of William Hopkins and aroused the interest of Daniel Sharpe, whose subsequent work led to …
  • … Darwin not only used his personal notes and records but, by letter, marshalled the resources of …
  • … of the laws of creation, Geographical Distribution’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, [10 February 1845] ) …

Darwin in letters,1866: Survival of the fittest

Summary

The year 1866 began well for Charles Darwin, as his health, after several years of illness, was now considerably improved. In February, Darwin received a request from his publisher, John Murray, for a new edition of  Origin. Darwin got the fourth…

Matches: 27 hits

  • … Pound foolish, Penurious, Pragmatical Prigs’ ( letter from J. D. Hooker, [29 December 1866] ). But …
  • … able to write easy work for about 1½ hours every day’ ( letter to H. B. Jones, 3 January [1866] ). …
  • … once daily to make the chemistry go on better’ ( letter from H. B. Jones, 10 February [1866] ). …
  • … see you out with our beagles before the season is over’ ( letter from John Lubbock, 4 August 1866 …
  • … work doing me any harm—any how I can’t be idle’ ( letter to W. D. Fox, 24 August [1866] ). …
  • … production of which Tegetmeier had agreed to supervise ( letter to W. B. Tegetmeier, 16 January …
  • … of “Domestic Animals & Cult. Plants” to Printers’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, 24 December [1866] …
  • … dimorphism and trimorphism, published between 1861 and 1864, which raised questions about hybrid …
  • … good deal I think, & have come to more definite views’ ( letter to T. H. Huxley, 22 December …
  • … ‘I quite follow you in thinking Agassiz glacier-mad’ ( letter to Charles Lyell, 8[–9] September …
  • … ten times more than the belief of a dozen physicists’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, [28 February 1866] …
  • … past few years. Emma described the Royal Society event in a letter to George: ‘Your father … entered …
  • … you—& told me to worship Bence Jones in future—’ ( letter from J. D. Hooker, 13 May 1866 ). …
  • … 3 calls! & then went for ¾ to Zoolog. Garden!!!!!!!!!’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, [28 April 1866 …
  • … delighted to come on those terms so you are in for it’ ( letter from H. E. Darwin, [  c . 10 May …
  • … very much to see him, though I dread all exertion’ ( letter to J. D. Hooker, [12 May 1866] ). …
  • … to Madeira. His visit to Down House is described in a letter from Henrietta to George: ‘when first …
  • … most magnificent eulogium which it has ever received’ ( letter to Ernst Haeckel, 18 August [1866] …
  • … like myself weak in his Greek, is something dreadful’ ( letter to T. H. Huxley, 22 December [1866] …
  • … progressive, teleological development ( see for example, letter to C. W. Nägeli, 12 June [1866] ). …
  • … His drawings of  C. scoparius , sent to Darwin with his letter of 8 May [1866] , allowed …
  • … initial state of dimorphism’ (Correspondence vol. 9, letter from Asa Gray, 11 October 1861 ). …
  • … that the species was ‘merely ordinaryly diœcious’ ( letter from W. E. Darwin, [7 May – 11 June 1866 …
  • … the Rhamnus is a case of dimorphic becoming diœcious’ ( letter from W. E. Darwin, 20 June [1866] ) …
  • … blows up— I am well accustomed to such explosions’ ( letter to W. E. Darwin, 22 June [1866] ). He …
  • … an expression first used by Herbert Spencer in an 1864 instalment of  Principles of biology . ( …
  • … when the young daughter of Hooker’s colleague at Kew, Daniel Oliver, died suddenly. ‘How grieved I …