Summary

Discusses possibility of publishing a sketch of his views.

Comments on CL’s letter [1862].

Mentions various geological topics.

Asks to borrow publication by Heer.

Mentions flight of Colymbetes over ocean.

Recalls visit by Wollaston.

Notes views of Hooker and Huxley on species.

Mentions ability of ducks to transport plant seeds.

Summary

Thanks CL for loan of [Matthew Fontaine?] Maury’s map.

Discusses possibility of submerged continental extension including Madeira, Canaries, and Azores.

Mentions icebergs as carriers of European plants.

Hooker’s work on Antarctic flora.

Comments on coolness of tropics in glacial period and consequent migrations. Hooker’s views on this.

Summary

Illnesses of Mrs Horner and Emma Darwin.

Death of Sarah Elizabeth Wedgwood.

Mentions work on his "Big Book" [Natural selection].

Remarks on J. A. H. de Bosquet’s discovery of a Chthamalus in the Chalk.

Summary

Condemns theory of Edward Forbes and others that many islands were formerly connected to South America by now submerged continents.

Summary

Cancelled: appears in 1917.

Summary

Cancelled: appears in 1920.

Summary

Discusses theory of submerged continental extensions. Objects that if it is applied to one island, it must be applied to all. Admits that some volcanoes may have been associated with subsidence, in contrast to his former view. Cites evidence from S. American Cordillera. Doubts that elevation associated with volcanoes is merely local, and that great ocean areas are necessarily sinking.

Says he will make his essay [on species] as complete as possible and will discuss CL’s Principles.

Summary

Speculates about cause of inclination in unusual columns of lava. Suggests CL check with William Hopkins about sliding movements in viscid matter.

Comments on CL’s expedition to Madeira.

Summary

Criticises at length the concept of submerged continents attaching islands to the mainland in the recent period. Notes drastic alteration of geography required, the dissimilar species on opposite shores of continents, and differences between volcanic islands and mountains of mainland areas. Admits sea-bed subsidence, but not enough to engulf continents. Denies that theory can explain island flora and fauna.

Considers Edward Forbes’s idea a check on study of dissemination of species.

Summary

To cast doubt on CD’s view that volcanic action is associated with elevation of land, CL suggests that local oscillations in strata underlying volcanoes could also explain how active volcanoes have uplifted fossil deposits of marine shells. Overall he is more inclined to believe that recent volcanoes belong to areas of subsidence rather than of elevation.

Summary

CD forgets an author [CD himself in Coral reefs] "who, by means of atolls, contrived to submerge archipelagoes (or continents?), the mountains of which must originally have differed from each other in height 8,000 (or 10,000?) feet".

CL begins to think that all continents and oceans are chiefly post-Eocene, but he admits that it is questionable how far one is at liberty to call up continents "to convey a Helix from the United States to Europe in Miocene or Pliocene periods".

Will CD explain why the land and marine shells of Porto Santo and Madeira differ while the plants so nearly agree?

Summary

Urges CD to publish his theory with small part of data.

Corrects names of land shells on list of shells picked up at Down.

Discusses transport of Ancylus from one river-bed to another by water-beetle.

"I hear that when you & Hooker & Huxley & Wollaston got together you made light of all Species & grew more & more unorthodox."

Mentions discussion of old Atlantis by Oswald Heer.

Comments on Helix and Nanina.

Mentions beetle discovered with small bag of eggs of water-spider under wing.

Madeira evidence favours single species birth-place theory.

Summary

Troubled by JDH’s connection between Antarctic island flora and Fuegia, which CD sees as part of a general relation to southern circumpolar flora. Encloses list [not found] of plants from Tristan d’Acunha.

Summary

Praises the Origin: a "splendid case of close reasoning".

Objects to CD’s having ignored Lamarck and Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire.

Thinks CD should omit mentioning problem of explaining the eye at the beginning of chapter 14. Suggests rewording several passages.

Thinks want of peculiar birds in Madeira a difficulty, considering presence of them in Galapagos.

Has always felt that the case of man and his races is one and the same with animals and plants.

Summary

Madeiran insects. Regards the "Atlantic province" as a centre of the Coleoptera.

Summary

Lyell urges CD to publish a sketch of species theory; CD asks JDH’s opinion on best course.

Concerned about opposition, particularly by Owen, to Huxley’s admission to Athenaeum.

Summary

Thanks for abstract of Etna paper [Philos. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. 148 (1858): 703–86]. Never expected to see Élie de Beaumont’s theory ["craters of elevation"] so completely upset. "He must have picked out favourable cases for measurement."

More than satisfied by what was done at Linnean Society [joint reading of CD’s and Wallace’s papers: "Tendency of species to form varieties", Collected papers 2: 3–19]. Intends to prepare longer abstract.

Summary

Everything in Wallace’s sketch also appears in CD’s sketch of 1844. A year ago CD sent a short sketch of his views to Asa Gray. Can CD honourably publish his sketch now that Wallace has sent outline of his views? "I would far rather burn my whole book than that he or any man shd. think that I had behaved in a paltry spirit." Does not believe Wallace originated his views from anything CD wrote to him.

Summary

CD returns a letter from Wollaston.

Although opposed to the Forbesian doctrine [of continental extension] as a general rule, CD would have no objection to its being proved in some cases. Does not think Wollaston has proved it; nor can anyone until more is known about the means of distribution of insects – but the identity of the two faunas is certainly interesting.

His health is very poor and his "everlasting species-Book" quite overwhelms him with work. It is beyond his powers, but he hopes to live to finish it.

Summary

Admires Edward Forbes’s theory of continental extensions, but it will discourage investigation of distribution.

Mentions Oswald Heer’s proposed map of Atlantis.

Discusses extinction of plants caused by the glacial era. Migration of plants and animals during glacial period.

Encourages CL’s work [on Antiquity of man (1863)].

Comments on unfriendly reviews. Asks CL’s opinion about including a reply to reviewers in next edition of Origin.