From Francis Walker 10 December 1843
Grove Cottage | Southgate
Decber. 10th.—43.
My dear Sir
I hope you will excuse my long delay in answering your request for information concerning the resemblance between the Chalcidites which you collected, & the European species of that tribe. I should have written sooner if I had anything to communicate respecting them. With a very few exceptions the species from all the localities are remarkably similar to those of Europe, & not as a group to be distinguished from them.
The species of Eucharis from Australia & from Bahia, Brazil, & Thoracantha Latreillii from the latter spot, are altogether different from the European forms, & so also is Miscogaster (Agamerian N.G. Haliday M.SS.) Gelo, an Australian species. Charles Isle, Galapagos presents a form quite distinct from any of Europe, it is Merostenus Sadales. Mr. Haliday1 has established the genus Lelaps upon it & upon another species found in St. Vincent’s Island by the Revd. Lansdown Guilding. There are a few other species from various localities differing slightly from the British forms, but I have very little knowledge of the European species, & only very few Chalcidites from the South of Europe have yet been described. I am glad that your Chalcidites are safely deposited in the British Museum,2 & I hope soon to be able to examine their structure more closely than I did when I described the species.3
Believe me my dear Sir | Yours very truly | Francis Walker.
Footnotes
Bibliography
Haliday, Alexander Henry. 1841–3. Contributions towards the classification of the Chalcididæ. Transactions of the Entomological Society of London 3: 295–301.
Walker, Francis. 1838. Descriptions of some Chalcidites discovered by C. Darwin, Esq. Entomological Magazine 5: 469–77.
Walker, Francis. 1839. Monographia Chalciditum. London: Hyppolitus Bailliere.
Summary
Chalcidites collected by CD are all similar to those of Europe. Mentions other specimens quite different from European forms.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-721
- From
- Francis Walker
- To
- Charles Robert Darwin
- Sent from
- Southgate
- Source of text
- DAR 205.3: 294
- Physical description
- ALS 2pp †
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 721,” accessed on 8 September 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-721.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 2