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Darwin Correspondence Project

From Philip Henry Gosse   5 April 1864

Sandhurst. Torquay

April 5. 1864

My dear Sir

You frequently allude to the emission of pollen-tubes;1 can you (without much trouble) tell me how to see & identify these. I do not know what to look for, or where, or how.2

I am succeeding in impregnating Orchids of widely different genera with the pollinia of each other.3 Is not this something new?

I see Catasetum is attracting notice.4 In a barrel of Orchids that was sent me last Autumn from the Amazon, there were many great masses of Catasetum tridentatum; of very large bulbs. Do you know any one who would exchange for these, other Orchids, such as Vanda, or Phalænopsis,—even small bits? As as I have much more than I care to grow, of Catasetum.

Believe me | Yours very truly | P. H. Gosse

C. Darwin Esqe

CD annotations

End of letter: ‘Brown.5 | Bush | Lance. | [illeg]6 pencil

Footnotes

CD mentioned pollen-tubes in Orchids, pp. 31, 81, 106, 109, 133, 248, 311–12 and 324 n., and in ‘Three sexual forms of Catasetum tridentatum, p. 248 (Collected papers 2: 69); see also, for example, Correspondence vol. 11, letter to P. H. Gosse, 2 June [1863] and n. 4.
See letter to P. H. Gosse, 7 April [1864], and n. 5, below. Since taking up residence in Devonshire, the zoologist and writer Gosse had become interested in cultivating orchids and had ‘formed a remarkable collection’ (DNB).
John Scott had been cross-pollinating different species of orchids, but not different genera (see letter from John Scott, 28 March 1864, and Scott 1863a and 1864b).
Catasetum tridentatum (a synonym of C. macrocarpum) was discussed in a paper by Hermann Crüger that was sent to the Linnean Society by CD and read on 3 March 1864 (see letter from Hermann Crüger, 21 January 1864, and n. 6, and Crüger 1864). Gosse may refer to the report of the paper published in Gardeners’ Chronicle, 26 March 1864, p. 294. CD had discussed this species in ‘Three sexual forms of Catasetum tridentatum and in Orchids, pp. 236–46.
CD may have intended to refer Gosse to Brown 1831, where pollen-tubes are discussed in detail (see, for example, pp. 724–6, 730), and which has plates illustrating the tubes (Brown 1831, tabs. 34–6; see also n. 1, above).
CD may have written the names of people he thought might be interested in Gosse’s Catasetum bulbs; John Henry Lance was an orchid fancier (R. Desmond 1994). See, however, the letter to P. H. Gosse, 7 April [1864]. Bush has not been identified.

Bibliography

Collected papers: The collected papers of Charles Darwin. Edited by Paul H. Barrett. 2 vols. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. 1977.

Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.

Crüger, Hermann. 1864. A few notes on the fecundation of orchids and their morphology. [Read 3 March 1864.] Journal of the Linnean Society (Botany) 8 (1865): 127–35.

Desmond, Ray. 1994. Dictionary of British and Irish botanists and horticulturists including plant collectors, flower painters and garden designers. New edition, revised with the assistance of Christine Ellwood. London: Taylor & Francis and the Natural History Museum. Bristol, Pa.: Taylor & Francis.

DNB: Dictionary of national biography. Edited by Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee. 63 vols. and 2 supplements (6 vols.). London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1912. Dictionary of national biography 1912–90. Edited by H. W. C. Davis et al. 9 vols. London: Oxford University Press. 1927–96.

Orchids: On the various contrivances by which British and foreign orchids are fertilised by insects, and on the good effects of intercrossing. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1862.

‘Three sexual forms of Catasetum tridentatum’: On the three remarkable sexual forms of Catasetum tridentatum, an orchid in the possession of the Linnean Society. By Charles Darwin. [Read 3 April 1862.] Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society (Botany) 6 (1862): 151–7. [Collected papers 2: 63–70.]

Summary

Asks how he can identify pollen-tubes.

Has succeeded in impregnating orchids of widely different genera with each other’s pollinia. "Is not this something new?"

Offers to exchange Catasetum for other varieties.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-4451
From
Philip Henry Gosse
To
Charles Robert Darwin
Sent from
Torquay
Source of text
DAR 165: 79
Physical description
ALS 2pp †

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 4451,” accessed on 16 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-4451.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 12

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