Summary

JDH busy reforming Kew’s operations.

Falconer may "fall foul" of Huxley’s anger over his attacks on Lyell.

Has heard of a coffee plantation post for Scott.

Summary

He is not grieved at CD’s omissions of his [JDH’s] work [from Origin, 4th ed.]. It proves nothing – claims only to be illustration of using CD’s methods.

Summary

Responds to CD’s criticisms. JDH is sometimes confused as to what he has borrowed from CD.

Summary

Asks whether he ought to write to CD while he is ill.

Wonders if he might use Haast’s notes on introduced animals for a notice he is preparing ["Note on the replacement of species in the colonies and elsewhere", Nat. Hist. Rev. n.s. 4 (1864): 123–7].

Summary

JDH battling with Lyell over treatment of species question in Antiquity of man. Distressed by Lyell’s raising false priority issue between JDH and CD. Falconer involved in a priority squabble.

Summary

Cannot come to lunch to meet Sir Henry Holland. Holland may have seen Robert Lowe [Lord Sherbrooke] already. Will CD let him know his views?

Summary

JDH on John Scott.

Curious about the rationale of pollen prepotence.

Working on variation in New Zealand flora.

Summary

All overworked at Kew.

Burchell collections enormous.

Lyell has sent MS of Principles p. 111 on changes of temperature. JDH thinks Lyell blunders and is out of his depth.

Charmed with E. B. Tylor’s book on man [Early history of mankind (1865)],

disappointed in Lubbock’s [Prehistoric times (1865)].

Summary

Does CD want Masdevallia?

Sends addresses of persons in S. America who would send Melastomataceae seeds.

Has ordered Matthieu Bonafous on maize [Histoire naturelle du maïs (1836)].

Summary

Returns Asa Gray letter. Gray has made a great blunder in his criticism of Oliver: he mistakes perpetuation of a variety for "propagation of variation". Confusion between "action of physical causes" and "effects of physical causes". Neither crossing nor natural selection has made so many divergent individuals, but simply variation. "If once you hold that natural selection can create a character your whole doctrine tumbles to the ground." CD’s failure to convey this, and the false doctrine that "like produces like" is at bottom of half the scientific infidelity to CD’s doctrine. There is something to the objection that CD has made a deus ex machina of natural selection since he neglects to dwell on the facts of infinite incessant variations.

Summary

Hopes Drosophyllum was all right.

Opinion of Council of Royal Society [on Presidency] is twelve for JDH, five for Duke of Devonshire, and G. B. Airy for William Spottiswoode.

Summary

Suggests CD consult George Busk about his stomach.

Summary

His appreciation of Insectivorous plants, especially Utricularia section.

Summary

More on Ayrton affair. Conduct of Gladstone and the Ministry despicable. They have owned him to be in right but will not raise a finger until exposure in Parliament is imminent.

Summary

W. J. Hooker is unwell.

Bentham wrote on Planchon ["The ancient and modern floras of Montpellier", Nat. Hist. Rev. (1865): 202–25],

T. Thomson on subspecies ["Species and subspecies", Nat. Hist. Rev. (1865): 226–42]

and Greene of York on ["The Linnean Society’s transactions", Nat. Hist. Rev. (1865): 189–202].

JDH did the leader in Gardeners’ Chronicle [(1865): 267–8, 291–2].

Delighted with CD’s calm opinion of Origin. Has same view of some of his own papers.

Summary

JDH on the Lyell–Lubbock plagiarism controversy. His view of the true cause of Lubbock’s behaviour.

Summary

Reception of Scott’s paper.

Difficulty of writing Boott’s obituary.

Critical of Edward Frankland’s glacial theory.

Falconer’s and Ramsay’s views on Himalayan lakes lack support of basic evidence.

Taxonomic distribution of climbing plants.

Huxley picks quarrels with minor figures and thus magnifies them.

Summary

JDH admits he wrote Gardeners’ Chronicle and Natural History Review articles on orchids [Gard. Chron. (1862): 789–90, 863, 910; Nat. Hist. Rev. n.s. 2 (1862): 371–6].

JDH’s objections to CD’s idea of how Greenland was repopulated. Temperate Greenland has as Arctic a flora as Arctic Greenland – a fact of astounding force. Why should certain Scandinavian species be absent? Migration by sea-currents can no more account for the present distribution in Greenland than can special creation.

Summary

Wife’s health better.

Visited Duke of Argyll.

Thanks CD for Cruciferae diagram; will ponder it.

Staggered by complexity of Welwitschia.

Summary

Flora of Cameroons shakes JDH’s faith in ability to explain past or present migrations. Sees need for a major novel explanation such as natural selection, glacial cold, or continental connections.

Lyell in a bad way about feud with Falconer.

JDH’s opinion of Wallace, Bates, J. E. Gray, Owen, Asa Gray, Lubbock, and Bentham.

Bentham’s Linnean Society address [see 4118].