Summary

Must prepare new edition of Origin.

Discusses structure of beehives. Mentions writings of Chauncey Wright on bees’ cells ["Remarks on the architecture of bees", Proc. Am. Acad. Arts & Sci. 4 (1857–60): 432–3].

Summary

Comments on note from Charles Kingsley saying CD’s theory is not opposed to a high conception of the Deity.

Mentions negative views of Origin of Sedgwick, John Crawfurd, Roderick Murchison, John Phillips, and Joseph Prestwich.

Summary

Preparation for his address with particular concern that JP approve the part relating to [Adam] Sedgwick. Urges JP to sit at dinner with him as a sign of approval of the award [of the Copley Medal].

Admits his own dismay regarding the efforts of the younger geologists and zoologists to obtain the Copley Medal for CD on the grounds of the Origin and his anxiety about the next year’s award.

Summary

Much interested in BS’s letter on gneiss ["Remarks on the geological relations of the gneiss of the Alps", Edinburgh New Philos. J. 42 (1847): 186–7].

Sends copy of South America.

Has shown that lamination of metamorphic schists closely allied with cleavage.

Summary

Feels he should decline Beagle voyage offer because of his father’s objections, which he lists. Would otherwise have taken all risks.

[Geological] trip with Adam Sedgwick a success.

Grieved at Marmaduke Ramsay’s death.

Summary

CD accepts going with Capt. FitzRoy. Explains earlier refusal as owing to his father’s disapproval.

Summary

Thanks CD for his contribution to the memoir of Henslow [L. Jenyns, Memoir of the Rev. John Stevens Henslow (1862)].

Summary

Comments on manuscript [? "On slaty cleavage", J. Geol. Soc. Lond. 5 (1849): 111–29]. Discusses phenomenon of cleavage. Will write to J. D. Forbes about DS’s paper.

Summary

Thanks WL for his MS on coral and suggests that it be sent to the Geological Society for printing or preserving in the archives.

Comments on his and WL’s bad health and recalls WL’s past kindness to him.

Summary

CD is pleased by BP’s appreciative opinion of Origin. He never intended to claim that he originated the doctrine that species have not been independently created. The only novelty in his work is the attempt to explain how species became modified and how the theory of descent explains large classes of facts. If he has taken anything from BP, he has done so unconsciously. Gives names of those he would have mentioned in any account of authors who maintained that species have not been separately created.

CD greatly admires BP’s Philosophy of creation.

Summary

CL would like to put Joachim Barrande on the Royal Society’s foreign list. Of French geologists and palaeontologists, he is the man who has made the greatest sacrifices and produced the greatest results.

Summary

CD in London to meet with naturalists about his collections. Lyell and Owen are helpful, but no one else, except R. E. Grant, seems to want to examine his specimens.

Summary

Discusses foliation and cleavage. Comments on dip of cleavage laminae in mountains. Mentions views of Sedgwick and Studer. Suggests reading C. L. von Buch [Travels through Norway and Lapland (1813)] "as an amusement". Praises views of William Hopkins. Suggests reading paper by H. D. Rogers ["On cleavage of slate-strata", Edinburgh New Philos. J. 41 (1846): 422–3)]. Comments on the paper.

Summary

Responds to Owen’s remarks that his book [Origin] is not likely to be true because it attempts to explain so much. CD describes how, for fear this might be so, he resolved to give up the work if he could not convince two or three competent judges. He is sensitive because of unjust things said by a distinguished friend [A. Sedgwick]. Value of his views now depends on men eminent in science.

Summary

Thanks ACR for papers.

Glad present situation of our continents has been confirmed.

Wishes ACR would prove his view of origin of Red Sandstones, which many dispute.

Summary

A letter of recommendation for W. B. Dawkins in his application for the Woodwardian professorship of geology in the university of Cambridge.

Summary

Writes of his work and a paper accepted for publication in the Philosophical Transactions [? "Stresses caused in the interior of the earth", Philos. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. 173 (1883): 187–230].

Gives news of friends.

Summary

Asks JSH to propose him for Geological Society. His meeting with Sir John Herschel and Andrew Smith at Cape of Good Hope.