Summary

[Letter written as a postscript to 11406.] CD has reread his letter of 7 Mar 1878 about the value of James Torbitt’s work on the potato disease and has nothing to withdraw. Emphasises Torbitt’s need for immediate financial help.

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Thanks THF for his contribution; now has £170 to permit Torbitt to carry on his experiments. Describes the scale of the experiments and his belief in their value.

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"I have seen the action on Ophrys exactly as you describe and am thoroughly ashamed of my inaccuracy."

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Sympathises with THF at being forestalled by Delpino, but urges him to publish confirmation.

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Comments on notes made by THF on Passiflora and Tacsonia. Suggests he examine more species. Recalls his own observations on P. princeps and Tacsonia.

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Hooker is greatly overworked at Kew and is trying to get the Government to provide some help. CD hopes THF will take an interest in the matter and forwards a copy of JDH’s application for an assistant.

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THF is seeking advice regarding the selection of an entomologist to carry out some duties [apparently pest destruction].

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Agricultural Society will not do potato experiments. Torbitt telegraphs that seeds to be sown tomorrow. Memorial with a few signatures might get grant from Government. Hooker believes plan the right one.

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Suggests THF write a paper on violets. Asa Gray, once a sceptic, now declares he is convinced whole structure of a flower is adapted for a cross with another individual.

Urges THF not to give up Pangenesis lightly. "It has thrown light on my mind in regard [to] a great series of complex phenomena."

Summary

Fertilisation of barberries.

Passiflora.

Is continuing his experiments on the comparative growth of crossed and self-fertilised plants.

Summary

Has received Ledum with its captured flies.

"At present I care for nothing in this wide world except the biology of seedling plants."

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Describes subscription for Torbitt [to continue potato experiments]. Would dislike writing to any paper, but Hensleigh [Wedgwood] and Erasmus [Darwin] advise CD to write to the Times.

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Sends some questions raised by THF’s notes on earthworms at Abinger; he plans to use them in his book.

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Questions the exact location of rooms and trenches at Abinger excavation [for Earthworms].

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THF’s view, if confirmed, pleases CD in that what appears a mere morphological character is found to be of use. Carl Nägeli has been attacking him on this head.

Summary

THF’s article in Nature ["The fertilisation of a few papilionaceous flowers", 6 (1872): 478–80, 498–501] is extremely good.

Suspects he now has answer to why common peas and sweetpeas hardly ever intercross, a point which half drove CD mad for years.

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Thinks THF has solved the mystery of Coronilla.

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Describes James Torbitt’s plan for producing disease-resistant potato varieties. [Letter is an earlier version of 11406.]

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More on W. Graham’s book, The creed of science. Chance and design. Happiness.

E. A. Darwin’s death [26 Aug 1881].

Summary

Will send THF’s paper [on scarlet runners] to Annals and Magazine of Natural History with a note recommending publication [see 6384].

Suggests books on Lobelia.