To Lawson Tait 15 August [1875]1
Down, | Beckenham, Kent. | Railway Station | Orpington. S.E.R.
Aug. 15th
My dear Sir
I must write one line to thank you cordially for your kind Review in the Spectator, which is most honourable to me & more than I deserve. You have, also, pleased me very much by your notice of my son Francis.—2 You will think me extra sceptical, but I cannot understand how the virgin pitchers of Nepenthes can have contained your droserine, seeing that the fluid was acid, at least in one case, & yet did not digest.3
My dear Sir | Yours sincerely | Ch. Darwin
I have been working so hard at new Edits, of old Books that I have had no time to think of anything else,, & have done too much, & must leave home for a little rest.—4
Footnotes
Bibliography
Climbing plants: On the movements and habits of climbing plants. By Charles Darwin. London: Longman, Green, Longman, Roberts & Green; Williams & Norgate. 1865.
Insectivorous plants. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1875.
Variation: The variation of animals and plants under domestication. By Charles Darwin. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1868.
Summary
Thanks him for his kind review of Insectivorous plants in the Spectator. Disputes Tait’s report of a Nepenthes that trapped a fly but did not digest it.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-10177F
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Robert Lawson (Lawson) Tait
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- Leeds University Library Special Collections (Brotherton Collection, tipped into Insectivorous plants (1875): MS Misc. Letters 2)
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 10177F,” accessed on 23 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-10177F.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 23