To J. D. Hooker 4 December [1864]
Down
Dec 4th
My dear Hooker.
Thanks for your two letters both most interesting to me.1 I am sorry for the row at R. Soc.y., but what a plucky man Huxley is for sticking up for his friends.2 I was greatly pleased & made very proud by Sabine’s address in the Reader,3 & I have told him so, only protesting that the Origin would some day soon be admitted.4 Now I feel sure that you wrote the part of the address about the Botany;5 no other human being would have written it with so much gusto; knowing this, you may well believe, how much pleased I have been. But some of your expressions are surely rather exaggerated. As for Sabine he will be sorrier than ever that I was proposed. If he really changed words of Council, no doubt Huxley was right to call him over the coals.6 Well all I can say is that I am hugely pleased with so splendid an eulogium. I wonder who aided Sabine in other parts; I suspect Busk.7 If Owen8 ever reads it he will gnash his teeth about the Succession of Forms on same continent & about large mammals, for both these subjects I have always thought he took from me & paraded as great & novel points.9 But enough & too much of this; but Sabine, through you to a very large part, has made me very proud of myself.—
I am particularly obliged about Climbers; I will quote Thomson on Butea10 & you on Dalbergia, Ruscus & Wisteria,11 & that will suffice.— I had plant in small pot of Wisteria, of which the long shoots tried for weeks to twine round a post 6 inches in diameter & always failed; yet these same shoots could ascend a thin stick perfectly.— I am very glad to hear about the Cucurbit. which I will just mention as described by Naudin:12 I have got two Bignonias besides the Ampelopsis which develope their discs, & they seem to me very curious from secreting a resinous cement, & from being enabled to envelope by actual growth the finest fibres.13 What is name of Cucurbit. genus & what is its native country? Are tips of tendrils enlarged? Are they much branched?14 I have just read through my gigantic paper on Climbers & am pleased with it;15 but Heaven knows whether it is really good. I was rather displeased with my Lythrum paper when I saw it in proof-sheets.16
Thanks for Hector’s letters—17 Is he not rather a rash speculator? But this, I believe, to be a fault on the right side.— If he can prove N. Zealand was first colonised from America, it will be grand.18
I am heartily glad that you have stirred up Linn. Soc. to publish quickly & regularly.—19
Farewell you best & kindest of correspondents, but do not kill yourself— Yours affect | C. Darwin
When next you write to Hector, suggest to him to observe what insects visit the few endemic Leguminosæ or the introduced kinds, especially white Clover.—20
It might be worth your while to consider whether a large proportion of plants in N. Zealand are destitute of white or coloured corolla.— 21
Footnotes
Bibliography
‘Climbing plants’: On the movements and habits of climbing plants. By Charles Darwin. [Read 2 February 1865.] Journal of the Linnean Society (Botany) 9 (1867): 1–118.
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Cross and self fertilisation: The effects of cross and self fertilisation in the vegetable kingdom. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1876.
DSB: Dictionary of scientific biography. Edited by Charles Coulston Gillispie and Frederic L. Holmes. 18 vols. including index and supplements. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons. 1970–90.
Journal of researches: Journal of researches into the geology and natural history of the various countries visited by HMS Beagle, under the command of Captain FitzRoy, RN, from 1832 to 1836. By Charles Darwin. London: Henry Colburn. 1839.
Marginalia: Charles Darwin’s marginalia. Edited by Mario A. Di Gregorio with the assistance of Nicholas W. Gill. Vol. 1. New York and London: Garland Publishing. 1990.
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.
Sabine, Edward. 1864. [Anniversary address, 30 November 1864.] Proceedings of the Royal Society of London 13 (1863–4): 497–517.
‘Three forms of Lythrum salicaria’: On the sexual relations of the three forms of Lythrum salicaria. By Charles Darwin. [Read 16 June 1864.] Journal of the Linnean Society (Botany) 8 (1865): 169–96. [Collected papers 2: 106–31.]
Summary
CD pleased with Huxley for defending him against Sabine. Also pleased with much of Sabine’s address. Is sure JDH wrote the botanical part.
Suggests James Hector observe which insects visit endemic New Zealand plants
and JDH examine distribution of white vs coloured corollas in New Zealand.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-4697
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- Joseph Dalton Hooker
- Sent from
- Down
- Source of text
- DAR 115: 255a–c
- Physical description
- ALS 6pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 4697,” accessed on 26 September 2022, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-4697.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 12