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From Fritz Müller1   31 March 1882

Blumenau, Sa. Catharina, Brazil,

31. März 1882.

Verehrter Herr!

Ich muss Ihre Verzeihung erbitten, weil ich so lange die Antwort auf Ihre freundlichen Briefe vom 19. Decbr. und vom 4. Januar verzögert habe; aber ich hatte wirklich Ihnen nichts mitzutheilen.2

Von meinen Lagerstroemia-Sämlingen hat einer, obwohl er kaum höher als 10 cm ist, schon zwei unvollkommene Blüten hervorgebracht, welche dadurch bemerkenswerth sind, dass sie 1) fünf Kelchblätter und ebenso viele Kronenblätter haben, während es bei den normalen Blüten deren sechs sind; 2) dadurch, dass sie beinah 14 Tage frisch bleiben, während die normalen Blüten am dritten Tage welken.3

Was die Veränderlichkeit bei den Blüten von Pontederia (Eichhornia) crassipes (die der Graf Solms-Laubach in Göttingen für mich bestimmt hat) betrifft, so bin ich ganz sicher, dass sie nicht auf den hybriden Ursprung zurückzuführen ist.4 Der Itajahy mirim, in dem unsere einheimische Pontederia (Eichhornia) azurea wächst, ist ungefähr 50 km von Blumenau entfernt; die Veränderlichkeit ist beschränkt auf die Farbe der Blüten, während die beiden Arten grosse Verschiedenheiten in manchen andern Theilen aufweisen, und als ich P. crassipes mit Pollen von P. azurea, welcher zwei Tage alt war, befruchtete, erhielt ich nicht eine einzige Frucht.5 P. crassipes, von der ich früher dachte, sie sei selbst unfruchtbar (self-sterile), ist mit ihrem eigenen Pollen ziemlich fruchtbar.6 Die Unfruchtbarkeit, welche ich in früheren Jahren beobachtete, war wahrscheinlich auf das Fehlen befruchtender Insecten zurückzuführen. Sogar jetzt, wenn die mittelgriffligen und die langgriffligen Formen untermischt mit einander wachsen, sind Früchte, die nur einige Samen enthalten, recht selten, und die meisten von ihnen sind sehr dürftig. Um ein Beispiel zu geben: drei Früchte einer mittelgriffligen Pflanze, legitim befruchtet mit dem Pollen einer langgriffligen Pflanze, enthielten im Durchschnitt 252 Samen; drei Früchte, illegitim befruchtet mit dem Pollen der kurzen Staubfäden einer langgriffligen Pflanze, enthielten im Durchschnitt 94 Samen; drei Früchte, befruchtet mit dem Pollen von ihren eigenen langen Staubfäden, 198 Samen und drei Früchte, befruchtet mit dem Pollen von ihren eigenen kurzen Staubfäden, 167 Samen.

In Früchten von P. crassipes, welche von langgriffligen oder mittelgriffligen Pflanzen erzeugt werden und befruchtet sind mit Pollen aus den kurzen Staubfäden einer dieser Formen, nehmen die Samen nur die oberen 34 oder 45 der Frucht ein, während der untere Theil der Placenta mit verschrumpften Eiern bedeckt ist, grade als ob die Pollenschläuche nicht lang genug gewesen wären, um so weit hinunterzureichen.

In der letzten Zeit habe ich begonnen Versuche zu machen mit Heteranthera reniformis; ich befruchtete die Blumen der einen Aehre mit blauem Pollen, und diejenige einer andern Aehre derselben Pflanze mit gelbem Pollen, und zwar entweder von derselben oder von einer andern Pflanze; es war gewöhnlich ein sehr deutlicher Unterschied in der Zahl der erzeugten Samen, aber in manchen Fällen brachte gelber Pollen, und in andern wieder blauer Pollen mehr Samen hervor.7 Z. B. hatten acht Früchte (befruchtet 29. Januar mit blauem Pollen) zwischen 70 und 80 Samen; sechs Früchte derselben Pflanze (befruchtet an demselben Tage mit gelbem Pollen) enthielten zwischen 20 and 25, im Durchschnitt 22 Samen. Dagegen brachten vier Blumen, welche am 16. Februar mit blauem Pollen befruchtet waren, Früchte hervor mit 72, 60, 59, 45, im Durchschnitt 59 Samen, während sechs Blumen derselben Pflanze, befruchtet an demselben Tage mit gelbem Pollen, Früchte erzeugten mit 93, 70, 100, 83, 80, 78, im Durchschnitt 84 Samen.

Heteranthera reniformis bringt bisweilen cleistogame Blüten, und einzelne Pflanzen-Individuen sind viel mehr geneigt, dies zu thun, als andere, welche mit ihnen an derselben Stelle wachsen.8 Die cleistogamen Blüten bieten in ihrem Bau keinerlei Besonderheiten; gewöhnlich bleibt die ganze Aehre eingeschlossen in der Scheide, welche dann einen vollkommen geschlossenen Sack darstellt; aber bisweilen ragen eine oder zwei Blumen aus der Scheide hervor, während der Rest eingeschlossen bleibt. Nun sind in manchen Fällen die eingeschlossenen Blumen ganz unfruchtbar, in andern aber erzeugen sie zahlreiche offenbar gute Samen. So zählte ich vor einigen Tagen die Samen in drei cleistogamen Aehren mit je 3, 5 und 6 Blumen und fand I: 84, 67, 122. II: 9, 55, 97, 81, 12. III: 72, 66, 96, 94, 97, 0 Samen.

Von Bentham u. Hooker’s gen. plant. empfing ich durch Ihre Güte drei Theile des ersten Bandes.9

Was Ihren Gedanken betrifft, ich solle ein “Journal of a naturalist in Brazil” schreiben, so habe ich viele Jahre gehofft, es sollte mit meiner Hülfe ein solches Buch meine Tochter Rosa schreiben, der ich alle meine vermischten Beobachtungen von allgemeinem Interesse überliefert haben würde; aber nun, da ich sie verloren habe, denke ich, wird das Buch ungeschrieben bleiben.10

Grade jetzt habe ich noch einmal Thomas Belt’s “naturalist in Nicaragua” gelesen und so noch einmal mich überzeugt, dass ich ganz ausser Stande sein würde, ein so anziehendes Buch zu schreiben. ....11

Footnotes

1
For a translation of this letter, see Appendix I. All Fritz Müller’s letters to CD were written in English (see Möller ed. 1915–21, 2: 72 n.); most of them have not been found. Many of the letters were later sent by Francis Darwin to Alfred Möller, who translated them into German for his Fritz Müller: Werke, Briefe und Leben (Möller ed. 1915–21). Möller also found final drafts of some Müller letters among the Fritz Müller papers and included these in their original English form (ibid., 2: 72 n). Where the original English versions are missing, the published version, usually appearing in German translation, has been used.
2
See Correspondence vol. 29, letter to Fritz Müller, 19 December 1881, and this volume, letter to Fritz Müller, 4 January 1882.
3
For Müller’s earlier observations on Lagerstroemia (the genus of crape myrtle), see Correspondence vol. 29, letter from Fritz Müller, 7 February 1881. In standard botanical usage, an imperfect flower is one lacking either the male or female organs. Müller uses the term loosely to refer to an atypical number of petals and sepals.
4
In his letter of 4 January 1882, CD had wondered whether the variability Müller observed in flowers of Pontederia crassipes (a synonym of Eichhornia crassipes, common water hyacinth) was the result of hybridisation. Hermann, Graf zu Solms-Laubach, was professor of botany at Göttingen (NDB).
5
The Itajahy Mirim (now Itajaí-Mirim) is a tributary of the Itajaí Açu; it flows south-west from the main river near Cordeiros. Pontederia azurea (a synonym of Eichhornia azurea, anchored water hyacinth) has pale blue to purple flowers.
6
Müller had discussed trimorphism in the Pontederia he found in the Itajahy-Mirim in ‘Ueber den Trimorphismus der Pontederien’ (On the trimorphism of Pontederia; F. Müller 1871). He had not mentioned whether plants he observed were self-sterile, but may have discussed this in his now missing letter of 2 December 1881 (see letter to Fritz Müller, 4 January 1882 and n. 4).
7
Heteranthera reniformis is kidneyleaf mudplantain; it is a member of the Pontederiaceae, the family of pickerel-weed. Müller had described its floral morphology, notably the two different sets of anthers with different coloured pollen, in his letter of 7 February 1881 (Correspondence vol. 29). Müller hypothesised that in flowers of this sort, one type of anthers attracted insects, while the other ensured cross-fertilisation.
8
Heteranthera reniformis is a water plant; open flowers sit above the water, but cleistogamic or closed flowers remain under water and are self-fertilising.
9
See letter to Fritz Müller, 4 January 1882 and n. 9. Genera plantarum (Bentham and Hooker 1862–83) was a systematic work undertaken by Joseph Dalton Hooker and George Bentham in 1860 (see Stearn 1956). CD had asked whether Müller had all the published volumes.
10
See letter to Fritz Müller, 4 January 1882 and n. 8. Müller’s daughter Rosa had died in 1879 (see Correspondence vol. 28, letter from Hermann Müller, 27 April 1880 and n. 2).
11
CD had recommended Thomas Belt’s book, The naturalist in Nicaragua (Belt 1874) to friends, and sent a copy to Fritz Müller (see Correspondence vol. 22, letter to Fritz Müller, 1 January 1874).

Bibliography

Belt, Thomas. 1874a. The naturalist in Nicaragua: a narrative of a residence at the gold mines of Chontales; journeys in the savannahs and forests. With observations on animals and plants in reference to the theory of evolution of living forms. London: John Murray.

Bentham, George and Hooker, Joseph Dalton. 1862–83. Genera plantarum. Ad exemplaria imprimis in herbariis Kewensibus servata definita. 3 vols. in 7. London: A. Black [and others].

Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.

Möller, Alfred, ed. 1915–21. Fritz Müller. Werke, Briefe und Leben. 3 vols in 5. Jena: Gustav Fischer.

Müller, Fritz. 1871. Ueber den Trimorphismus der Pontederien. Jenaische Zeitschrift für Medicin und Naturwissenschaft 6: 74–8.

NDB: Neue deutsche Biographie. Under the auspices of the Historical Commission of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. 27 vols. (A–Wettiner) to date. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot. 1953–.

Stearn, William T. 1956. Bentham and Hooker’s Genera plantarum: its history and dates of publication. Journal of the Society for the Bibliography of Natural History 3 (1953–60): 127–32.

Translation

From Fritz Müller1   31 March 1882

Blumenau, Sa. Catharina, Brazil,

31. March 1882.

Dear Sir!

I must beg your pardon for having delayed so long answering your kind letters of 19 Decbr. and 4 January; but I really had nothing to report.2

Of my Lagerstroemia seedlings one, although it is barely over 10 cm tall, has produced two imperfect flowers, which are noteworthy in that 1) they have five sepals and as many petals, while in normal flowers there are six of them; 2) in that they remain fresh for almost 14 days, while the normal flowers wilt on the third day.3

Concerning the variability in the flowers of Pontederia (Eichhornia) crassipes (which Graf Solms-Laubach of Göttingen identified for me), I am quite certain that it does not derive from a hybrid origin.4 The Itajahy mirim, in which our indigenous Pontederia (Eichhornia) azurea grows, is around 50 km from Blumenau; the variability is limited to the colour of the flowers, while the two species display substantial differences in many other respects, and when I fertilised P. crassipes with the pollen of P. azurea, which was two days old, it yielded not a single fruit.5 P. crassipes, which I previously thought was self infertile (self-sterile), is fairly fertile with its own pollen.6 The infertility that I observed in earlier years should probably be attributed to the absence of fertilising insects. Even now when the medium-styled and the long-styled forms grow mixed together, fruits with only a few seeds are quite rare and most of them are very poor. To give an example: three fruits of a medium-styled plant, legitimately fertilised with the pollen of a long-styled plant, on average contained 252 seeds; three fruits, illegitimately fertilised with the pollen of the short stamens of a long-styled plant, on average contained 94 seeds; three fruits, fertilised with the pollen from the plant’s own long stamens, 198 seeds and three fruits, fertilised with the pollen from the plant’s own short stamens, 167 seeds.

In fruits of P. Crassipes produced by long-styled or medium-styled plants and fertilised with pollen from the short stamens of one of these forms, the seeds occupy just the upper 34 or 45 of the fruit, while the lower part of the placenta is covered with shrivelled ovules, just as though the pollen tubes had not been long enough to reach that far down.

Recently, I have started to experiment with Heteranthera reniformis; I fertilised the flowers of one spike with blue pollen, and those of another spike of the same plant with yellow pollen, specifically, either of the same or of another plant; usually there was an obvious difference in the number of seeds produced, but in some cases the yellow pollen, and again in other cases the blue pollen, produced more seeds.7 E.g. eight fruits (fertilised with blue pollen on 29 January) contained between 70 and 80 seeds; six fruits of the same plant (fertilised with yellow pollen on the same day) contained between 20 and 25, on average 22 seeds. However, four flowers that had been fertilised on 16 February with blue pollen produced fruits with 72, 60, 59, 45, on average 59 seeds, while six flowers of the same plant, fertilised with yellow pollen on the same day, produced fruit with 93, 70, 100, 83, 80, 78, on average 84 seeds.

Heteranthera reniformis produces cleistogamic flowers sometimes, and isolated individual plants are much more inclined to do so than others that grow with them in the same spot.8 The cleistogamic flowers offer no peculiarities of structure; usually the whole spike remains encased in the sheath, which looks like a completely closed sac; occasionally, however, one or two flowers protrude from the sheath, while the rest remain enclosed. Now, in some cases the enclosed flowers are completely infertile, in other cases, however, they produce numerous apparently good seeds. Thus a few days ago I counted the seeds of three cleistogamic spikes with 3, 5 and 6 flowers each and found I: 84, 67, 122. II: 9, 55, 97, 81, 12. III: 72, 66, 96, 94, 97, 0 seeds.

Through your kind offices I received three parts of the first volume of Bentham & Hooker’s gen. plant.9

Concerning your idea that I should write a “Journal of a naturalist in Brazil”, I had hoped for many years that with my help my daughter Rosa, whom I would have given all my miscellaneous observations of general interest, would write such a book; but now that I have lost her I think the book will remain unwritten.10

Just now I have read Thomas Belt’s “naturalist in Nicaragua” again and so convinced myself yet again that I would be absolutely not in a position to write such an attractive book. ....11

Footnotes

1
For a transcription of this letter in the German of its published source, see Transcript. All Fritz Müller’s letters to CD were written in English (see Möller ed. 1915–21, 2: 72 n.); most of them have not been found. Many of the letters were later sent by Francis Darwin to Alfred Möller, who translated them into German for his Fritz Müller: Werke, Briefe und Leben (Möller ed. 1915–21). Möller also found final drafts of some Müller letters among the Fritz Müller papers and included these in their original English form (ibid., 2: 72 n). Where the original English versions are missing, the published version, usually appearing in German translation, has been used.
2
See Correspondence vol. 29, letter to Fritz Müller, 19 December 1881, and this volume, letter to Fritz Müller, 4 January 1882.
3
For Müller’s earlier observations on Lagerstroemia (the genus of crape myrtle), see Correspondence vol. 29, letter from Fritz Müller, 7 February 1881. In standard botanical usage, an imperfect flower is one lacking either the male or female organs. Müller uses the term loosely to refer to an atypical number of petals and sepals.
4
In his letter of 4 January 1882, CD had wondered whether the variability Müller observed in flowers of Pontederia crassipes (a synonym of Eichhornia crassipes, common water hyacinth) was the result of hybridisation. Hermann, Graf zu Solms-Laubach, was professor of botany at Göttingen (NDB).
5
The Itajahy Mirim (now Itajaí-Mirim) is a tributary of the Itajaí Açu; it flows south-west from the main river near Cordeiros. Pontederia azurea (a synonym of Eichhornia azurea, anchored water hyacinth) has pale blue to purple flowers.
6
Müller had discussed trimorphism in the Pontederia he found in the Itajahy-Mirim in ‘Ueber den Trimorphismus der Pontederien’ (On the trimorphism of Pontederia; F. Müller 1871). He had not mentioned whether plants he observed were self-sterile, but may have discussed this in his now missing letter of 2 December 1881 (see letter to Fritz Müller, 4 January 1882 and n. 4).
7
Heteranthera reniformis is kidneyleaf mudplantain; it is a member of the Pontederiaceae, the family of pickerel-weed. Müller had described its floral morphology, notably the two different sets of anthers with different coloured pollen, in his letter of 7 February 1881 (Correspondence vol. 29). Müller hypothesised that in flowers of this sort, one type of anthers attracted insects, while the other ensured cross-fertilisation.
8
Heteranthera reniformis is a water plant; open flowers sit above the water, but cleistogamic or closed flowers remain under water and are self-fertilising.
9
See letter to Fritz Müller, 4 January 1882 and n. 9. Genera plantarum (Bentham and Hooker 1862–83) was a systematic work undertaken by Joseph Dalton Hooker and George Bentham in 1860 (see Stearn 1956). CD had asked whether Müller had all the published volumes.
10
See letter to Fritz Müller, 4 January 1882 and n. 8. Müller’s daughter Rosa had died in 1879 (see Correspondence vol. 28, letter from Hermann Müller, 27 April 1880 and n. 2).
11
CD had recommended Thomas Belt’s book, The naturalist in Nicaragua (Belt 1874) to friends, and sent a copy to Fritz Müller (see Correspondence vol. 22, letter to Fritz Müller, 1 January 1874).

Bibliography

Belt, Thomas. 1874a. The naturalist in Nicaragua: a narrative of a residence at the gold mines of Chontales; journeys in the savannahs and forests. With observations on animals and plants in reference to the theory of evolution of living forms. London: John Murray.

Bentham, George and Hooker, Joseph Dalton. 1862–83. Genera plantarum. Ad exemplaria imprimis in herbariis Kewensibus servata definita. 3 vols. in 7. London: A. Black [and others].

Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.

Möller, Alfred, ed. 1915–21. Fritz Müller. Werke, Briefe und Leben. 3 vols in 5. Jena: Gustav Fischer.

Müller, Fritz. 1871. Ueber den Trimorphismus der Pontederien. Jenaische Zeitschrift für Medicin und Naturwissenschaft 6: 74–8.

NDB: Neue deutsche Biographie. Under the auspices of the Historical Commission of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences. 27 vols. (A–Wettiner) to date. Berlin: Duncker & Humblot. 1953–.

Stearn, William T. 1956. Bentham and Hooker’s Genera plantarum: its history and dates of publication. Journal of the Society for the Bibliography of Natural History 3 (1953–60): 127–32.

Summary

Apologises for not having answered CD’s letters of 19 December [13564] and 4 January [13599] sooner.

Gives the results of his crossing experiments with Pontederia (Eichhornia) crassipes and P. azurea. Has also begun experiments on Heteranthera reniformis.

Thanks CD for sending three parts of the first volume of Bentham and Hooker’s Genera plantarum.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-13750A
From
Johann Friedrich Theodor (Fritz) Müller
To
Charles Robert Darwin
Sent from
Blumenau, Santa Catharina, Brazil
Source of text
Möller ed. 1915–21, 2: 424–5
Physical description
Inc (German translation)

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 13750A,” accessed on 10 November 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-13750A.xml

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