skip to content
Home

Darwin Correspondence Project

To William Robinson   5 May [1866]1

Down. | Bromley. | Kent. S.E.

May 5th

Dear Sir

I write one line to thank you & to say that it wd. be superfluous to castrate the flowers, which are crossed with pollen from a distinct plant, grown under as different circumstances as may be. The flowers fertilised with their actually own pollen shd. certainly be protected from insects.2

Dear Sir | yours much obliged | C. Darwin

P.S. I was glad to see your Election to Linn. Soc.—3

Footnotes

1
The year is established by the date of Robinson’s election to the Linnean Society (see n. 3, below).
2
Robinson’s letter has not been found; see, however, the letter to William Robinson, [29 April 1866] and nn. 4 and 6. CD had asked Robinson to make crosses of the waterlily Euryale ferox, and to compare the number of seeds in crossed individuals with that in self-pollinated specimens. CD asked for a similar experiment to be made with any species of Nymphaea, and instructed Robinson to protect the self-pollinated individuals from insects. Presumably it was not necessary to remove the anthers from the flowers because of the prepotency of the pollen from other individuals (see Cross and self fertilisation, p. 2).
3
Robinson was elected a fellow of the Linnean Society on 19 April 1866 (List of the Linnean Society of London 1866).

Bibliography

Cross and self fertilisation: The effects of cross and self fertilisation in the vegetable kingdom. By Charles Darwin. London: John Murray. 1876.

List of the Linnean Society of London. London: [Linnean Society of London]. 1805–1939.

Summary

Writes a line of thanks; includes instructions on procedure for crossing experiments.

Letter details

Letter no.
DCP-LETT-5080
From
Charles Robert Darwin
To
William Robinson
Sent from
Down
Source of text
Royal Horticultural Society, Lindley Library (WRO/2/26)
Physical description
ALS 1p

Please cite as

Darwin Correspondence Project, “Letter no. 5080,” accessed on 19 April 2024, https://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/letter/?docId=letters/DCP-LETT-5080.xml

Also published in The Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 14

letter

Darwin Correspondence Project
darwin@lib.cam.ac.uk

© University of Cambridge 2022

Copyright declaration

Privacy policy

Website by Surface Impression

 

Study at Cambridge

About the University

Research at Cambridge