To F. T. Buckland 11 December [1864]
Summary
Asks for comparison of otter-hounds’ feet with those of other dogs.
Changes in oysters.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Francis Trevelyan (Frank) Buckland |
Date: | 11 Dec [1864] |
Classmark: | DAR 261.11: 7 (EH 88206059) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4713 |
To J. D. Hooker 2 June [1864]
Summary
Requests climbing plants.
Asks that Oliver be told that he now does not care "how many tendrils he makes axial".
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | 2 June [1864] |
Classmark: | DAR 115: 237 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4517 |
From Hugh Falconer 3 November 186[4]
Author: | Hugh Falconer |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 3 Nov 186[4] |
Classmark: | DAR 164: 19 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4652 |
From J. D. Hooker 5 September 1864
Summary
R. I. Murchison’s address [see 4595] smashes Ramsay’s glacial theory.
JDH defends his view that CD should not answer Kölliker.
Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 5 Sept 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 101: 238–9 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4608 |
From B. P. Brent 2 September 1864
Summary
Did not get appointment to poultry department of the Field; W. B. Tegetmeier has the position.
His lawsuit concluded well but expensive. Thanks CD for aid during his distress; encloses cheque.
Author: | Bernard Peirce Brent |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 2 Sept 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 160: 303 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4607 |
From F. T. Buckland 13 December 1864
Summary
Sorry to hear CD ill.
On his return from Galway, will arrange with CD about visiting and showing him his specimens.
Author: | Francis Trevelyan (Frank) Buckland |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 13 Dec 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 160: 357 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4714 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … from the Second Regiment of Life Guards in 1857, and obtained the rank of major-general in …
From J. D. Hooker 26 August 1864
Summary
Hookers and Lyells will visit Lubbocks so he cannot see CD in London.
Will CD sit for Woolner?
Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 26 Aug 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 101: 234–5 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4600 |
From Bernard Peirce Brent 18 June 1864
Summary
Has been informed Miss E. Watts retiring from poultry department of the Field and would like to take the post if made available. Asks CD if he would provide a reference for him if necessary.
Has bred and reared a young turtle-dove.
On progress of his lawsuit.
Author: | Bernard Peirce Brent |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 18 June 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 160: 302 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4538 |
From James Buckman 10 October 1864
Summary
Sends a poem about sowing kidney beans.
Author: | James Buckman |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 10 Oct 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 271.6: 1 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4631F |
Matches: 1 hit
- … 6, letter to James Buckman, 4 October [1857] . Buckman is cited in Variation regarding …
To J. D. Hooker [1 September 1864]
Summary
CD continues to have trouble reconciling the Veitch’s names for Bignonia plants and Kew names.
Lyell and Falconer called on CD in London.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | [1 Sept 1864] |
Classmark: | DAR 115: 248 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4605 |
From Robert Thomson 24 July 1864
Summary
Observations on insects visiting Melastomataceae.
Author: | Robert Thomson |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 24 July 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 178: 117 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4574 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … garden at Castleton had been purchased in 1857. Thomson was stationed at Castleton and, …
From Ernst Haeckel 10 August 1864
Summary
Sends photographs of himself and his late wife [Anna Sethe]. Describes death of his wife.
Plans trip to the Alps.
Thanks CD for biographical information about himself.
Mentions Goethe as early evolutionist.
Cites Kant as early supporter of epigenesis.
Mentions criticism of CD’s theory by R. A. von Kölliker ["Über die Darwin’sche Schöpfungstheorie", Z. Wiss. Zool. 14 (1864): 174–86].
Author: | Ernst Philipp August (Ernst) Haeckel |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 10 Aug 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 166: 38 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4586 |
To Ernst Haeckel [after 10] August – 8 October [1864]
Summary
Can understand EH’s feelings on death of his wife.
CD was impressed by manner in which species in South America are replaced by closely allied ones, by affinity of species inhabiting islands near S. America, and by relation of living Edentata and Rodentia to extinct species. When he read Malthus On population, the idea of natural selection flashed on him.
Agrees with EH’s remarks on Kölliker ["Darwin’sche Schöpfungstheorie", Z. Wiss. Zool. 14 (1864): 174–86].
Asks EH to thank Carl Gegenbaur [for Vergleichende Anatomie der Wirbelthiere (1864)].
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Ernst Philipp August (Ernst) Haeckel |
Date: | [after 10] Aug – 8 Oct [1864] |
Classmark: | Ernst-Haeckel-Haus (Bestand A–Abt. 1: 1–52/5) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4631 |
To E. A. Darwin 30 June 1864
Summary
Has heard nothing about the Copley Medal. Is grateful for Hugh Falconer’s interest [see 4546].
Supplies details about circumstances of his voyage on the Beagle.
Does not believe that his sea-sickness was the cause of his subsequent ill-health.
Encloses the requested list of publications [see 4550].
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Erasmus Alvey Darwin |
Date: | 30 June 1864 |
Classmark: | ML 1: 247–8; DAR 154: 67 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4548A |
Matches: 1 hit
- … of the Linnean Society ( Botany ) 1 (1857): 130–40 ( Collected papers 1: 264–73). Origin. …
From William Marshall 12 June 1864
Summary
Informs CD of two distinct forms of Plantago lanceolata.
Author: | William Marshall |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 12 June 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 109: A88–9 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4530 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … two papers on the plant ( Marshall 1852 and 1857). After its introduction to England from …
To T. H. Huxley 11 April [1864]
Summary
Thanks for Lectures on the elements of comparative anatomy [1864].
If Owen wrote article on "Oken" [Encyclopaedia Britannica, 8th ed.] and French work on archetype he never did a baser act [see ML 1: 246 n.].
Bad health lately.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Thomas Henry Huxley |
Date: | 11 Apr [1864] |
Classmark: | Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine Archives (Huxley 5: 203) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4459 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … from T. H. Huxley, [before 3 October 1857] ; Correspondence vol. 11, letter to J. D. …
From Andrew Crombie Ramsay 10 July 1864
Summary
Sends 2d ed. of his Physical geology [1864]; hopes that he will burn the 1st because of its errors.
ACR is convinced he is right about denudation of the Weald.
Author: | Andrew Crombie Ramsay |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 10 July 1864 |
Classmark: | DAR 176: 12 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4557 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … pp. 75–85). CD had consulted Ramsay in 1857 and 1858 on the depth of various geological …
To Daniel Oliver 11 March [1864]
Summary
Struck with corresponding positions of tendrils and flower-stalks in Passiflora. Sends [W. E. Darwin’s] dissection drawings of earliest stages. Infers that tendril is a modified flower peduncle.
Requests DO look at mode of climbing in Tecoma.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Daniel Oliver |
Date: | 11 Mar [1864] |
Classmark: | DAR 157.2: 69–70; DAR 261.10: 40 (EH 88206023) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4424 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … between the stem and a leaf (see Gray 1857 , p. 206). In his memorandum of [28 January – …
From Daniel Oliver [1 April 1864]
Author: | Daniel Oliver |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | [1 Apr 1864] |
Classmark: | DAR 157.2: 106 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4443 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … de la Société Botanique de France 4 (1857): 109–11, 142–6, 322–4, 744–56, and 787–8. Mohl …
To J. D. Hooker [27 January 1864]
Summary
CD continues very ill.
His only work is a little on tendrils and climbers. Asks whether all tendrils are modified leaves or whether some are modified stems.
Last number [Jan 1864?] of Natural History Review is best that has appeared.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
Date: | [27 Jan 1864] |
Classmark: | DAR 115: 218 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4398 |
Matches: 1 hit
- … gourds, were modified branches ( Gray 1857 , pp. 38–9). John Stevens Henslow thought …
Darwin, C. R. | (9) |
Hooker, J. D. | (4) |
Brent, B. P. | (2) |
Buckland, Frank | (1) |
Buckman, James | (1) |
Darwin, C. R. | (14) |
Hooker, J. D. | (3) |
Buckland, Frank | (1) |
Darwin, E. A. | (1) |
Haeckel, Ernst | (1) |
Darwin, C. R. | (23) |
Hooker, J. D. | (7) |
Brent, B. P. | (2) |
Buckland, Frank | (2) |
Haeckel, Ernst | (2) |
Six things Darwin never said – and one he did
Summary
Spot the fakes! Darwin is often quoted – and as often misquoted. Here are some sayings regularly attributed to Darwin that never flowed from his pen.
Matches: 1 hits
- … Spot the fakes! Darwin is often quoted – and as often misquoted. Here are some sayings regularly …
Darwin in letters, 1856-1857: the 'Big Book'
Summary
In May 1856, Darwin began writing up his 'species sketch’ in earnest. During this period, his working life was completely dominated by the preparation of his 'Big Book', which was to be called Natural selection. Using letters are the main…
Matches: 11 hits
- … of information about his preoccupations during 1856 and 1857. They reveal little noticed aspects of …
- … as ever I can.’ ( letter to W. D. Fox, 8 February [1857] ). Darwin also attempted to test …
- … the alpine plants pretty effectually’ complained Darwin in 1857 ( letter to J. D. Hooker, [2 May …
- … of calculation was wrong ( letter to John Lubbock, 14 July [1857] ). Darwin thought his results …
- … experiments on plants through the summers of 1856 and 1857, particularly with garden vegetables like …
- … Chronicle and Agricultural Gazette in October 1857, to be followed by a second notice in 1858. …
- … find the work: am I not a kind Father?’ Darwin wrote in 1857, soon followed by the complaint ‘You …
- … to end!’ (letters to W. E. Darwin, [17 February 1857] and 21 [July 1857] ). The problem of …
- … of his manuscript ( letter to A. R. Wallace, 1 May 1857 ) seem innocuous and hardly the veiled …
- … are all vividly displayed in Darwin's letters. By the end of 1857, Darwin was well on the way …
- … long letter to Asa Gray ( letter to Asa Gray, 5 September [1857] ). From this letter it is evident …
Darwin and Down
Summary
Charles and Emma Darwin, with their first two children, settled at Down House in the village of Down (later ‘Downe’) in Kent, as a young family in 1842. The house came with eighteen acres of land, and a fifteen acre meadow. The village combined the…
Matches: 1 hits
- … was in Darwin’s day. To J. D. Hooker, 3 June [1857] : on the struggle for existence in …
Language: key letters
Summary
How and why language evolved bears on larger questions about the evolution of the human species, and the relationship between man and animals. Darwin presented his views on the development of human speech from animal sounds in The Descent of Man (1871),…
Matches: 1 hits
- … 2070: Wedgwood, Hensleigh to Darwin, C. R., [before 29 Sept 1857] Darwin’s brother-in-law, …
Abstract of Darwin’s theory
Summary
There are two extant versions of the abstract of Darwin’s theory of natural selection. One was sent to Asa Gray on 5 September 1857, enclosed with a letter of the same date (see Correspondence vol. 6, letter to Asa Gray, 5 September [1857] and enclosure).…
Matches: 3 hits
- … natural selection. One was sent to Asa Gray on 5 September 1857, enclosed with a letter of the same …
- … to Prof. Asa Gray, Boston, U.S., dated Down, September 5th, 1857.” (Darwin and Wallace 1858, p. 50). …
- … was sent to A. Gray 8 or 9 months ago, I think October 1857 [‘or perhaps’ del ]’. The printed …
Dramatisation script
Summary
Re: Design – Adaptation of the Correspondence of Charles Darwin, Asa Gray and others… by Craig Baxter – as performed 25 March 2007
Matches: 4 hits
- … the Origin of Species…’ FOUNDATIONS OF FAITH: 1857-1858 In which Gray and Hooker …
- … JUNE 1855 20 C DARWIN TO A GRAY, 1 JANUARY 1857 21 A GRAY TO C DARWIN, …
- … MARCH 1862 35 C DARWIN TO A GRAY, 1 JANUARY 1857 36 A GRAY TO C DARWIN …
- … OCTOBER 1858 59 A GRAY TO JD HOOKER, 12 OCTOBER 1857 60 A GRAY TO JD HOOKER, …
The "wicked book": Origin at 157
Summary
Origin is 157 years old. (Probably) the most famous book in science was published on 24 November 1859. To celebrate we have uploaded hundreds of new images of letters, bringing the total number you can look at here to over 9000 representing more than…
Matches: 1 hits
- … ’s appearance, but there is a fascinating scrap from 1857 comparing his views on species to …
Darwin’s study of the Cirripedia
Summary
Darwin’s work on barnacles, conducted between 1846 and 1854, has long posed problems for historians. Coming between his transmutation notebooks and the Origin of species, it has frequently been interpreted as a digression from Darwin’s species work. Yet…
Matches: 3 hits
What is an experiment?
Summary
Darwin is not usually regarded as an experimenter, but rather as an astute observer and a grand theorist. His early career seems to confirm this. He began with detailed note-taking, collecting and cataloguing on the Beagle, and edited a descriptive zoology…
Natural Selection: the trouble with terminology Part I
Summary
Darwin encountered problems with the term ‘natural selection’ even before Origin appeared. Everyone from the Harvard botanist Asa Gray to his own publisher came up with objections. Broadly these divided into concerns either that its meaning simply wasn’t…
Matches: 1 hits
- … written in 1842 , and, as he told Asa Gray in September 1857 , he intended to call the ‘ big …
Dates of composition of Darwin's manuscript on species
Summary
Many of the dates of letters in 1856 and 1857 were based on or confirmed by reference to Darwin’s manuscript on species (DAR 8--15.1, inclusive; transcribed and published as Natural selection). This manuscript, begun in May 1856, was nearly completed by…
Matches: 7 hits
- … Many of the dates of letters in 1856 and 1857 were based on or confirmed by reference to Darwin’s …
- … 4 26 January 1857 Variation under nature (DAR 9; …
- … 5 3 March 1857 The struggle for existence as bearing on …
- … 6 31 March 1857 On natural selection (DAR 10.2; …
- … 7 29 September 1857 Laws of variation: varieties & …
- … 8 29 September 1857 Difficulties on the theory of …
- … 9 29 December 1857 Hybridism (DAR 12; Natural …
The evolution of honeycomb
Summary
Honeycombs are natural engineering marvels, using the least possible amount of wax to provide the greatest amount of storage space, with the greatest possible structural stability. Darwin recognised that explaining the evolution of the honey-bee’s comb…
Matches: 1 hits
- … of other cells. (Letter from G. R. Waterhouse, 14 April 1857 .) In a later letter …
Darwin's bad days
Summary
Despite being a prolific worker who had many successes with his scientific theorising and experimenting, even Darwin had some bad days. These times when nothing appeared to be going right are well illustrated by the following quotations from his letters:
Matches: 1 hits
- … Despite being a prolific worker who had many successes with his scientific theorising and …
Darwin in letters, 1882: Nothing too great or too small
Summary
In 1882, Darwin reached his 74th year Earthworms had been published the previous October, and for the first time in decades he was not working on another book. He remained active in botanical research, however. Building on his recent studies in plant…
Scientific Networks
Summary
Friendship|Mentors|Class|Gender In its broadest sense, a scientific network is a set of connections between people, places, and things that channel the communication of knowledge, and that substantially determine both its intellectual form and content,…
Women’s scientific participation
Summary
Observers | Fieldwork | Experimentation | Editors and critics | Assistants Darwin’s correspondence helps bring to light a community of women who participated, often actively and routinely, in the nineteenth-century scientific community. Here is a…
Alfred Russel Wallace
Summary
Wallace was a leading Victorian naturalist, with wide-ranging interests from biogeography and evolutionary theory to spiritualism and politics. He was born in 1823 in Usk, a small town in south-east Wales, and attended a grammar school in Hertford. At the…
Matches: 3 hits
Before Origin: the ‘big book’
Summary
Darwin began ‘sorting notes for Species Theory’ on 9 September 1854, the very day he concluded his eight-year study of barnacles (Darwin's Journal). He had long considered the question of species. In 1842, he outlined a theory of transmutation in a…
Matches: 7 hits
- … ago’, he wrote to the American botanist Asa Gray in July 1857, it occurred to me that …
- … staggered about the permanence of species.— By 1857, Darwin had found the confidence to …
- … And this much acceleration I owe to you. ’ In February 1857, the rate of this acceleration was …
- … the way facts fall into groups ’, he told Fox in February 1857. Trials of strength …
- … in theory of the descent of species ’. In December 1857, Darwin had expressed his satisfaction that …
- … there is no good & original observation ’. In 1857, Darwin recorded in his journal that …
- … varieties differ from each other’, he told Wallace in May 1857, before stating ‘ I am now preparing …
The writing of "Origin"
Summary
From a quiet rural existence at Down in Kent, filled with steady work on his ‘big book’ on the transmutation of species, Darwin was jolted into action in 1858 by the arrival of an unexpected letter (no longer extant) from Alfred Russel Wallace outlining a…
Matches: 3 hits
- … completed his ninth chapter, on hybridism, on 29 December 1857, Darwin began in January 1858 to …
- … on variation under nature. Having learned in the summer of 1857 that his method for deriving …
- … with an abstract of his views sent to Asa Gray in September 1857. The correspondence between Darwin, …
Darwin’s reading notebooks
Summary
In April 1838, Darwin began recording the titles of books he had read and the books he wished to read in Notebook C (Notebooks, pp. 319–28). In 1839, these lists were copied and continued in separate notebooks. The first of these reading notebooks (DAR 119…
Matches: 21 hits
- … 112 Jukes. “Students Manual of Geology” [Jukes 1857]— published a few years ago, good on …
- … Lucas l’Heredite Naturelle [Lucas 1847–50] 1857 Nov. 15. Andersson Lake Gnami …
- … Thackeray English Humourists [Thackeray 1853] 1857 Jan. Cockburn life of Selby [ …
- … 1856]: H. Coverdale [Smedley [1854–6]: Quits [Tautphoeus] 1857] 29 Lutfullah. Life of …
- … Marsh] 1858] Buckle History of Civilisation [Buckle 1857] Feb. 28 Sir J. Mackintosh …
- … Oct. 22. Olmstead Journey through Texas [Olmsted 1857] Dec. Motley’s History of Dutch …
- … 1853]— Aug.— Sherard Osborne’s Quedah [Osborn 1857] d[itt]o d[itt]o Arctic Journal …
- … Harris 1842] Jukes Student Manual of Geology [Jukes 1857] Azara’s Quadrupeds [Azara …
- … *119: 18v.; 119: 8a, 21a Buckle, Henry Thomas. 1857. History of civilization in …
- … 21v., 22; 119: 19a Gaskell, Elizabeth Cleghorn. 1857. The life of Charlotte Brontë . …
- … [Abstract in DAR 205.3: 138.] 119: 20a ——. 1857. The student’s manual of geology. …
- … [Other eds.] *119: 15v. Livingstone, David. 1857. Missionary travels and researches …
- … 3 vols. Vivay. [Other eds.] *119: 22 Lutfullah. 1857. Autobiography of Lutfullah: a …
- … *119: 23; 128: 5 Napier, William Francis Patrick. 1857. The life and opinions of General …
- … of Elgin’s mission to China and Japan in the years 1857, 1858, 1859 . 2 vols. Edinburgh and …
- … on their economy . New York. 128: 25 ——. 1857. A journey through Texas; or, a winter …
- … an Arctic journal\. London. 128: 25 ——. 1857. Quedah; or, stray leaves from a journal …
- … Rouvroy, Louis de, Duke de Saint-Simon Vermandois. 1857. The memoirs of the Duke of Saint Simon on …
- … [Other eds.] *119: 1v.; 119: 12a Smiles, Samuel. 1857. The life of George Stephenson, …
- … New York. *128: 178 [Tautphoeus, Jemima von]. 1857. Quits; a novel . 3 vols. London. …
- … . Edited by J. C. Morris. Madras. 1833–51. Second series, 1857–. [Abstract in DAR 74: 177.] *119: …