To J. D. Hooker 7 September [1854]
Down.
Sept. 7th
My dear Hooker
Busy as you always are, it was really very good of you to write me so long a letter, some ten days ago,1 telling me so very many things to interest me.— Yesterday I had to send to the Athenæum, so I thought I could send at same time my Barnacle Book,2 & Rejuvenescence &c;3 there, directed to you.—
I am very glad you wish to have my Barnacle Book, for I would rather send it to you than to any half-dozen-others, if you cared to have it. Our old friend Arthrobalanus is now christened Cryptophialus.4 Under the Order to which it belongs, I discuss the (as it appears to me) very curious case of its affinities; I was most uncomfortably puzzled how to class it, & am far from sure that I decided correctly.—5
You will find a great deal about what is an individual in Braun: ever since seeing years ago with you here, the purple Laburnum,6 in which even the petals consisted of half & half, I have looked, without any gain, to all that I could read about individuality. What you say on the seed, is the newest view, which I have met with.—
But I cannot say that I have really read Braun.—
I thank you particularly for Huxley’s review7 it is exquisite & most clever, all about Owen.— The Review part strikes me as the best I have seen, on poor Vestiges, but I think he is too severe,—you may say “birds of a feather flock together”, & therefore I sympathise with the author. I fear (& for this I am very sorry) he makes mincemeat with Agassiz’s embryonic fish. Touching progression it must have been very satisfactory to you. I am very glad to hear about the placental Stonesfield Mammals; Waterhouse, years & years ago, told me he doubted whether they were placentata, but in those days it wd. have been more than his life was worth to have gone against the great Hunterian Professor.—8 Thanks, also, for Nun,9 which has interested me a good deal, though written in a most un-Robinson-Crusoe style. I am very glad to hear of the second edition of your Journal, but what a rascally little sum of money you have got for it. Anyhow it was more than I did for my first Edition, which was,£40, paid for copies to give away. Murray gave me £150 for his Edition.10 By the way I thank Mrs. Hooker much for sending me Humboldts letter, (so splendidly copied out):11 it really must be very satisfactory to you to see how well he has read your Book.— It is too good a joke, the way the Lancet treats you.—12 all Doctors, however, do not undervalue you, for I was speaking to one lately about your Journal, & I did not know how much he knew of you; so I said “we shall see him some day the first Botanist in Europe”, whereupon he snubbed me by saying, “Sir, he is decidedly now the first Botanist in Europe”.—
I hope that your Syon House party went off, brilliantly: I cannot make up my mind about Liverpool,13 it is such an exertion; but my wife today declares she thinks she shall be well enough to go & wd. like it, which may possibly decide me to go.—
I have been reading lately “Westwoods modern Class: of insects,”14 & I want you, who take an active share in scientific business, to bear Westwood in mind whenever a turn comes for a zoological Royal medal. I think he must feel that years of hard work & of careful observation & of dissection have not been much recognised by the men of science of this country.—15
I have been frittering away my time for the last several weeks in a wearisome manner, partly idleness, & odds & ends, & sending ten-thousand Barnacles out of the house all over the world.— But I shall now in a day or two begin to look over my old notes on species.16 What a deal I shall have to discuss with you: I shall have to look sharp that I do not “progress” into one of the greatest bores in life to the few like you with lots of knowledge. I hope I have not already bored you with this long letter.
Affectionately 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–.
Living Cirripedia (1854): A monograph of the sub-class Cirripedia, with figures of all the species. The Balanidæ (or sessile cirripedes); the Verrucidæ, etc. By Charles Darwin. London: Ray Society. 1854.
Nunn, John. 1850. Narrative of the wreck of the ‘Favorite’ on the island of Desolation: detailing the adventures, sufferings, and privations of John Nunn. Edited by W. B. Clarke. London: William Edward Painter.
Variation: The variation of animals and plants under domestication. By Charles Darwin. 2 vols. London: John Murray. 1868.
Westwood, John Obadiah. 1839–40. An introduction to the modern classification of insects; founded on the natural habits and corresponding organisation of the different families. 2 vols. London: Longman, Orme, Brown, Green, and Longman.
Summary
On individuality.
Huxley’s review exquisite, but too severe on Vestiges; sorry for ridicule of Agassiz’s embryonic fishes.
Stonesfield mammals.
J. O. Westwood deserves Royal Society Medal.
Will begin species work in a few days.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-1588
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Joseph Dalton Hooker
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 114: 124
- Physical description
- ALS 10pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 1588,” accessed on 12 October 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-1588.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 5