To W. E. Darwin 3 May [1864]1
My dear William.—
I send some flowers of long & short-styled Pulmonaria & I shd be very much obliged for mere outline of size of anthers of the 2 forms by the camera, that I may truly compare sizes; this being very important for me.—2
Very many thanks for measures of pollen of red cowslip: I am very much surprised at its size:3 I must, however, beg you to measure once again the grain in comparison with those of the short-styled wild cowslip; taking care that the latter have soaked rather the longest.4 I will send other flowers as soon as I have any.
Yours affect. | C. Darwin
May 3d.—
You had better brush off the pollen.—
P.S. Will you notice in the young anthers, perhaps pollen is shed whether there seems to be more pollen in the one form than in the other?—5
I am too bad to observe it.6
Footnotes
Bibliography
Correspondence: The correspondence of Charles Darwin. Edited by Frederick Burkhardt et al. 29 vols to date. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1985–.
Forms of flowers: The different forms of flowers on plants of the same species. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1877.
‘Illegitimate offspring of dimorphic and trimorphic plants’: On the character and hybrid-like nature of the offspring from the illegitimate unions of dimorphic and trimorphic plants. By Charles Darwin. [Read 20 February 1868.] Journal of the Linnean Society of London (Botany) 10 (1869): 393–437.
Summary
Thanks WED for measuring cowslip pollen. Sends dimorphic flowers.
Letter details
- Letter no.
- DCP-LETT-4480
- From
- Charles Robert Darwin
- To
- William Erasmus Darwin
- Sent from
- unstated
- Source of text
- DAR 97: A8, A10
- Physical description
- ALS 3pp
Please cite as
Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 4480,” accessed on 24 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-4480.xml
Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 12