To P. L. Sclater 12 [March 1861]
Down Bromley Kent
12th.
My dear Mr Sclater
One line to thank you for the Rabbit received safely.1
I am very glad you like Asa Gray: I fully thought that I had sent you a copy, but have just looked at my list & find that by some accident your name omitted.2
You will receive in short time a copy of my new Edit. (corrected) of the Origin, which Murray tells me he will soon distribute.—3 I am most uncommonly pleased, I can assure you, to hear that you are become “heretical” on species.— I perceived with no surprise that you were at first dead against me: in fact I cannot say that I respect anyone who has knowledge & can change his opinion suddenly on such a point.— If any fair & good opportunity occurs in any publication, I hope that you will say a word on our side: for I observe that those opposed write vehemently, & those on our side are silent; consequently the public have no means of knowing how many are on our side. But day before yesterday I had letter from a Professor, who dares not speak out.— Your note has pleased me very much: though I did not intend to have written all this.
Ever yours | C. Darwin
Footnotes
Bibliography
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Origin: On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1859.
Summary
Promises to send copy of Origin [3d ed.].
Is pleased that PLS has "become ""heretical"" on species".
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-3086
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Philip Lutley Sclater
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.240)
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 3086,” accessed on
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 9
