From P. L. Sclater 17 April 1861
Zoological Society of London, | 11, Hanover Square, | London, W.
April 17th 1861
My dear Sir
In p. 422 of your new edition you say “Madeira does not possess one peculiar bird”—1 This is not quite the fact. Out of the 99 birds given by Mr Vernon Harcourt in Ann. N.H. June 1855 as belonging to its Fauna one—Regulus maderensis is peculiar— it is of course an altered form of R. auricapillus.2 Three others Fringilla canariensis, Cypselus unicolor and Columba trocaz if not peculiar are distinct from European species and only found elsewhere in the Canaries— I am not aware that Cyps. unicolor has been met with even there.
Very faithfully Your’s | P. L. Sclater
CD annotations
Footnotes
Bibliography
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Harcourt, Edward Vernon. 1855. Notes on the ornithology of Madeira. Annals and Magazine of Natural History 2d ser. 15: 430–8.
Origin 4th ed.: On the origin of species by means of natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life. 4th edition, with additions and corrections. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1866.
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
Corrects CD’s statement [Origin, 3d ed.] that Madeira does not possess one peculiar bird. There is one, out of the 99.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-3121
- From
- Philip Lutley Sclater
- To
- Charles Robert Darwin
- Sent from
- Zoological Society
- Source of text
- DAR 205.3: 292
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp †
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 3121,” accessed on 2 November 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-3121.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 9