To Daniel Oliver 3 November [1860]
Summary
DO’s candidacy for Professorship of Botany [at University College, London].
Henrietta’s health is better.
Paper in Botanische Zeitung [T. Nitschke, "Über die Reizbarkeit der Blätter von Drosera rotundifolia", 18: 229–34, 237–45, 245–50] missed leading point that plants close longer over animal substances. Carbonate of ammonia works on Lemna and Euphorbia roots.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Daniel Oliver |
| Date: | 3 Nov [1860] |
| Classmark: | DAR 261.10: 24 (EH 88206008) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2975 |
To Syms Covington 9 March 1856
Summary
Thanks SC for his interesting account of the state of the colony. SC was wise to settle there where his sons have much better prospects.
Has finished his book on barnacles [1854]. Royal Medal awarded him chiefly for this work.
Asks SC whether he has observed any odd imported breeds of poultry, for his work on variation of species.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Syms Covington |
| Date: | 9 Mar 1856 |
| Classmark: | Sydney Mail, 9 August 1884, p. 255 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1840 |
To Asa Gray 21 February [1858]
Summary
Asks whether botanists tend to record varieties more carefully in large genera or small genera.
Wants information on the ranges of varieties of a species compared to the range of the species.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Asa Gray |
| Date: | 21 Feb [1858] |
| Classmark: | Archives of the Gray Herbarium, Harvard University (21) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2218 |
To J. D. Dana 10 October [1853]
Summary
Thanks JDD for copy of his Crustacea [1852–5]
and D. D. Owen’s Report [of a geological survey of Wisconsin, etc. (1852)].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | James Dwight Dana |
| Date: | 10 Oct [1853] |
| Classmark: | Yale University Library: Manuscripts and Archives (Dana Family Papers (MS 164) Series 1, Box 2, folder 43) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1534 |
To Syms Covington 21 October 1853
Summary
Comments on SC’s trip to the gold diggings. CD is most interested in Australia and reads every book about it that he can find. Sends news of former Beagle shipmates FitzRoy, Sulivan, Mellersh, and of Fuegia [Basket].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Syms Covington |
| Date: | 21 Oct 1853 |
| Classmark: | Sydney Mail, 9 August 1884, p. 254 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1538 |
Matches: 2 hits
- … see n.4, below). In his letter to Syms Covington, 14 March 1852 , CD had asked Covington …
- … 1852 ( Mellersh 1968 , p. 270). During his governorship of New Zealand, Robert FitzRoy had used his own funds, as he had during the Beagle voyage, for purposes for which he should have obtained government approval and for which he was not reimbursed (see Correspondence vol. 3, letter …
To J. D. Dana 15 February [1852]
Summary
Sending first volumes on Living and Fossil Cirripedia. Solicits JDD’s opinion, especially on sexual relations of Scalpellum and Ibla, on which he "hardly expect[s] to be believed".
Sends unusual crustacean specimen collected by B. J. Sulivan.
The Sporillus sent by JDD is a very curious species of Acasta [see Living Cirripedia 2: 319].
Asks JDD to identify and give geographical distribution of pieces of coral in which some cirripedes are imbedded.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | James Dwight Dana |
| Date: | 15 Feb [1852] |
| Classmark: | Yale University Library: Manuscripts and Archives (Dana Family Papers (MS 164) Series 1, Box 2, folder 43) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1473 |
Matches: 3 hits
- … was lost in the mail (see letter to J. D. Dana, 8 May [1852] ). Dana had sent CD two …
- … living specimens (see letter to J. D. Dana, 25 November [1852] ). A major character of …
- … 1852 –3). CD had earlier sent Dana specimens of a Lernaea-like crustacean he had found adhering to a Balanus ( Correspondence vol. 4, letter …
To J. D. Dana 6 December [1853]
Summary
Responds to JDD’s objections to his views on the three pairs of appendages in larvae of cirripedes. Reports observations which confirm his views.
Gives his confidential opinion of A. White, C. S. Bate, T. Bell, and W. Baird.
Interested in JDD’s observation that Crustacea are not most developed in the tropics. If JDD ever works it out either in number of species or rank, CD would be glad to have result.
Comments on article by Henri Milne-Edwards ["Crustacés", Ann. Sci. Nat. (Zool.) 18 (1852): 109–66].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | James Dwight Dana |
| Date: | 6 Dec [1853] |
| Classmark: | Yale University Library: Manuscripts and Archives (Dana Family Papers (MS 164) Series 1, Box 2, folder 43) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1542 |
Matches: 4 hits
- … 19 (1855): 272. Dana 1852 –3. Probably from Dana 1853 (see letter to J. D. Dana, 10 …
- … 29 December [1850] ; see also letter to J. D. Dana, 8 May [1852] . Living Cirripedia ( …
- … of Science and Arts (see letter to J. D. Dana, 25 November [1852] ). Living Cirripedia ( …
- … letter to J. D. Dana, 27 September [1853] , CD wrote about John Lubbock : ‘if you can ever give him a little encouragement it would really be a good service, for he … may do good work in Natural History. ’ In Living Cirripedia (1854): 107, CD wrote ‘With regard to the homologies of these three pairs of limbs, my first impression was that they were the mandibles and the two pairs of maxillæ in their earliest condition; but I consider this view as quite untenable, for several reasons’ and he cited a passage from Dana 1852 – …
To James Dwight Dana 12 August [1849]
Summary
Describes his research on cirripedes: an "anatomical and systematic catalogue". Asks to borrow specimens.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | James Dwight Dana |
| Date: | 12 Aug [1849] |
| Classmark: | Yale University Library: Manuscripts and Archives (Dana Family Papers (MS 164) Series 1, Box 2, folder 43) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1250 |
To Charles Lyell 15 February [1853]
Summary
Returns Lake Superior [1850], which he already has received from Agassiz. Thanks for pamphlets by C. B. Adams [on Mollusca, Contrib. Conchol. 10 (1851): 189–206; 11 (1852): 207–15].
Describes his dissection of an unusual cirripede [Alcippe lampas] with 12 males attached [see Living Cirripedia 2: 556, 558].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
| Date: | 15 Feb [1853] |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.103) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1502 |
Matches: 2 hits
- … 1851a , 1851b, and 1852. The copies mentioned in the letter are in the Darwin Pamphlet …
- … letter to Louis Agassiz, 15 June [1850] ). Agassiz’s presentation copy of Lake Superior , with CD’s notes pinned in back of the volume, is in the Darwin Library–CUL. CD recorded having read it between 16 August 1850 and early November 1850 ( Correspondence vol. 4, Appendix IV, 119: 22a). Lyell had returned from a visit to the United States of America just before Christmas 1852. …
To A. A. Gould 29 February [1852]
Summary
Sends presentation copy of Fossil Cirripedia.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Augustus Addison Gould |
| Date: | 29 Feb [1852] |
| Classmark: | Houghton Library, Harvard University (Augustus A. Gould papers, 1831–66 MS Am 1210: 226) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1475 |
To Salt & Son 26 November [1850]
Summary
Inquires about financial matters.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Salt & Sons |
| Date: | 26 Nov [1850] |
| Classmark: | Shropshire Archives (SA D3651/B/47/1/35) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1372 |
To Swale and Wilson [on or before 24 October 1849]
Summary
Orders books [Hugh Miller, Foot-prints of the Creator (1849)
and Carl Wilhelm von Humboldt, Thoughts and opinions of a statesman, Sir Arthur Helps, ed. (1849)].
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Swale and Wilson |
| Date: | [on or before 24 Oct 1849] |
| Classmark: | W. H. Thorpe (private collection) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1263 |
To Albany Hancock 12 February [1853]
Summary
Describes anatomy and growth stages of Alcippe in close detail.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Albany Hancock |
| Date: | 12 Feb [1853] |
| Classmark: | Archives of the New York Botanical Garden (Charles Finney Cox Collection) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1501 |
To J. D. Hooker 9 February [1865]
Summary
Falconer’s death haunts him. Personal annihilation not so horrifying to him as sun cooling some day and human race ending.
His health has been wretched.
Masters has written his agreement with CD’s "Climbing plants".
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Date: | 9 Feb [1865] |
| Classmark: | DAR 115: 260 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-4769 |
From William Turner 3 January 1870
Summary
On the development of the mammae and the glands of the skin. R. A. v. Kölliker and Carl von Langer are the authorities [See Descent 1: 209].
| Author: | William Turner |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 3 Jan 1870 |
| Classmark: | DAR 80: B158–9 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-7088 |
To W. D. Fox 7 March [1852]
Summary
Congratulates and "condoles" with WDF on a tenth child.
On education, he has not had courage to break away from "the old stereotyped stupid classical education"; has sent William to Rugby.
The first Ray Society volume [Living Cirripedia] is finished.
Has joined in a society to prosecute violators of the act against use of children in climbing chimneys.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | William Darwin Fox |
| Date: | 7 Mar [1852] |
| Classmark: | Christ’s College Library, Cambridge (MS 53 Fox 80) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1476 |
Matches: 4 hits
- … he did in letters to the Naval and Military Gazette (10 and 31 January 1852), proposing …
- … Annual Register (1852): 478–81. Panagæus crux major . In his letters to Fox, CD frequently …
- … 1852, Fox’s fifth child by his second wife. CD refers to the 1849 Californian gold-rush (see also Correspondence vol. 4, letter …
- … letters to W. D. Fox, May 1832 , [7–11] March 1835 , and 15 February 1836 ; and Correspondence vol. 2, [25 March 1843]. See also Autobiography , p. 63. The Parliamentary Acts of 1834 and 1840 prohibiting the use of boys under the age of sixteen as apprentices to chimney-sweeps failed to provide for enforcement. Lord Shaftesbury introduced bills in the House of Lords in 1851 and 1852 …
To Frederick Ransome [6 February 1866]
Summary
Requests repayment of loan as FR promised last spring.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Frederick Ransome |
| Date: | [6 Feb 1866] |
| Classmark: | DAR 96: 13 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-5148 |
From Melchior Neumayr 19 September 1879
Summary
Sends new publication [see 11838].
Plans major study of evolutionary palaeontology.
Comments on form series discovered by Joachim Barrande.
Has not heard from Leopold Würtenberger.
| Author: | Melchior Neumayr |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | 19 Sept 1879 |
| Classmark: | DAR 172: 17 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-12234 |
Matches: 2 hits
- … of brachiopods, see Barrande 1852–1911 , 5: 35–41. See letter from Leopold Würtenberger, …
- … letter from Melchior Neumayr, 21 January 1879 . The Lias is a series of strata forming the lower Jurassic ( OED ). Wilhelm Kobelt was a co-founder of the Deutsche Malakozoologische Gesellschaft (German Malacological Society) in Frankfurt am Main; he published extensively on European marine shells ( NDB ). The fifth volume of Joachim Barrande’s Systême silurien du centre de la Bohême ( Barrande 1852– …
To Charles Lyell 25 November [1860]
Summary
Discusses elevation and subsidence of Europe.
| Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Addressee: | Charles Lyell, 1st baronet |
| Date: | 25 Nov [1860] |
| Classmark: | American Philosophical Society (Mss.B.D25.235) |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2997 |
From J. D. Hooker [6 April 1866]
Summary
Reference to description of Begonia phyllomaniaca.
Thanks for the explicit account of Pangenesis. Thinks he now follows CD’s ideas but Pangenesis is very difficult and speculative.
Oliver has lost his little girl.
| Author: | Joseph Dalton Hooker |
| Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
| Date: | [6 Apr 1866] |
| Classmark: | DAR 102: 69–70 |
| Letter no: | DCP-LETT-5047 |
| letter | (284) |
| people | (10) |
| bibliography | (1) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (86) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (35) |
| Dana, J. D. | (14) |
| Lyell, Charles | (12) |
| Darwin, W. E. | (8) |
| Darwin, C. R. | (279) |
| Hooker, J. D. | (51) |
| Dana, J. D. | (18) |
| Lyell, Charles | (14) |
| Darwin, W. E. | (9) |
| 1834 | (1) |
| 1847 | (2) |
| 1848 | (7) |
| 1849 | (5) |
| 1850 | (8) |
| 1851 | (15) |
| 1852 | (23) |
| 1853 | (18) |
| 1854 | (14) |
| 1855 | (19) |
| 1856 | (20) |
| 1857 | (12) |
| 1858 | (5) |
| 1859 | (9) |
| 1860 | (17) |
| 1861 | (8) |
| 1862 | (11) |
| 1863 | (21) |
| 1864 | (10) |
| 1865 | (12) |
| 1866 | (9) |
| 1867 | (4) |
| 1868 | (2) |
| 1869 | (3) |
| 1870 | (5) |
| 1871 | (6) |
| 1872 | (1) |
| 1873 | (3) |
| 1874 | (1) |
| 1875 | (4) |
| 1876 | (2) |
| 1878 | (1) |
| 1879 | (3) |
| 1880 | (3) |
Edward Lumb
Summary
Edward Lumb was born in Yorkshire. According to the memoirs of his daughter Anne, Lady Macdonell, he travelled to Buenos Aires aged sixteen with his merchant uncle, Charles Poynton, and after some fortunate enterprises set up in business there. In 1833…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Edward Lumb was born in Yorkshire. According to the memoirs of his daughter Anne, Lady Macdonell, …
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: 1 hits
- … In April 1838, Darwin began recording the titles of books he had read and the books he wished to …
Darwin and Fatherhood
Summary
Charles Darwin married Emma Wedgwood in 1839 and over the next seventeen years the couple had ten children. It is often assumed that Darwin was an exceptional Victorian father. But how extraordinary was he? The Correspondence Project allows an unusually…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Charles Darwin married Emma Wedgwood in 1839 and over the next seventeen years the couple had ten …
Living and fossil cirripedia
Summary
Darwin published four volumes on barnacles, the crustacean sub-class Cirripedia, between 1851 and 1854, two on living species and two on fossil species. Written for a specialist audience, they are among the most challenging and least read of Darwin’s works…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin published four volumes on the crustacean sub-class Cirripedia between 1851 and 1854, two on …
Scientific Practice
Summary
Specialism|Experiment|Microscopes|Collecting|Theory Letter writing is often seen as a part of scientific communication, rather than as integral to knowledge making. This section shows how correspondence could help to shape the practice of science, from…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Specialism | Experiment | Microscopes | Collecting | Theory Letter writing …
'An Appeal' against animal cruelty
Summary
The four-page pamphlet transcribed below and entitled 'An Appeal', was composed jointly by Emma and Charles Darwin (see letter from Emma Darwin to W. D. Fox, [29 September 1863]). The pamphlet, which protested against the cruelty of steel vermin…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The four-page pamphlet transcribed below and entitled 'An Appeal', was composed jointly by Emma …
Darwin's health
Summary
On 28 March 1849, ten years before Origin was published, Darwin wrote to his good friend Joseph Hooker from Great Malvern in Worcestershire, where Dr James Manby Gully ran a fashionable water-cure establishment. Darwin apologised for his delayed reply to…
Matches: 1 hits
- … On 28 March 1849, ten years before Origin was published, Darwin wrote to his good friend …
3.9 Leonard Darwin, photo on horseback
Summary
< Back to Introduction It is so rare to encounter an image of Darwin in a specific locale that a family photograph of him riding his horse Tommy takes on a special interest. He is at the front of Down House, the door of which is open; it seems as…
Matches: 1 hits
- … < Back to Introduction It is so rare to encounter an image of Darwin in a specific …
New material added to the American edition of Origin
Summary
A ‘revised and augmented’ American edition of Origin came on the market in July 1860, and was the only authorised edition available in the US until 1873. It incorporated many of the changes Darwin made to the second English edition, but still contained…
Matches: 1 hits
- … The ‘historical sketch’ printed as a preface to the American edition ( Origin US ed., pp …
George Busk
Summary
After the Beagle voyage, Darwin’s collection of bryozoans disappears from the records until the material was sent, in 1852, for study by George Busk, one of the foremost workers on the group of his day. In 1863, on the way down to Malvern Wells, Darwin had…
Matches: 1 hits
- … After the Beagle voyage, Darwin’s collection of bryozoans disappears from the records until …
Hermann Müller
Summary
Hermann (Heinrich Ludwig Hermann) Müller, was born in Mühlberg near Erfurt in 1829. He was the younger brother of Fritz Müller (1822–97). Following the completion of his secondary education at Erfurt in 1848, he studied natural sciences at Halle and Berlin…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Hermann (Heinrich Ludwig Hermann) Müller, was born in Mühlberg near Erfurt in 1829. He was the …
Jane Gray
Summary
Jane Loring Gray, the daughter of a Boston lawyer, married the Harvard botanist Asa Gray in 1848 and evidence suggests that she took an active interest in the scientific pursuits of her husband and his friends. Although she is only known to have…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Jane Loring Gray, the daughter of a Boston lawyer, married the Harvard botanist Asa Gray in 1848 …
Wearing his knowledge lightly: From Fritz Müller, 5 April 1878
Summary
Darwin received letters from so many people and wrote so many fascinating letters himself, that it’s hard to choose from many letters that stand out, but one of this editor’s favourites, that always brings a smile, is a letter from Fritz Müller written 5…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Darwin received letters from so many people and wrote so many fascinating letters himself, that it …
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: 1 hits
- … Wallace was a leading Victorian naturalist, with wide-ranging interests from biogeography and …
Arthur Mellersh
Summary
Arthur Mellersh was a midshipman (promoted to mate during the voyage) serving on the Beagle at the time when Darwin was travelling around the world. One account suggests an inauspicious start to their friendship; apparently Mellersh introduced himself…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Arthur Mellersh was a midshipman (promoted to mate during the voyage) serving on the Beagle at …
Darwin’s observations on his children
Summary
Charles Darwin’s observations on the development of his children, began the research that culminated in his book The Expression of the emotions in man and animals, published in 1872, and his article ‘A biographical sketch of an infant’, published in Mind…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Charles Darwin’s observations on the development of his children,[1] began the research that …
Syms Covington
Summary
When Charles Darwin embarked on the Beagle voyage in 1831, Syms Covington was ‘fiddler & boy to Poop-cabin’. Covington kept an illustrated journal of his observations and experiences on the voyage, noting wildlife, landscapes, buildings and people and,…
Matches: 1 hits
- … When Charles Darwin embarked on the Beagle voyage in 1831, Syms Covington was ‘ fiddler & boy …
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
- … Honey-bees construct wax combs inside their nests. The combs are made of hexagonal prisms – cells …
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 …
Fritz Müller
Summary
Fritz Müller, a German who spent most of his life in political exile in Brazil, described Darwin as his second father, and Darwin's son, Francis, wrote that, although they never met 'the correspondence with Müller, which continued to the close of…
Matches: 1 hits
- … Francis Darwin, in Life and letters of Charles Darwin , wrote of Fritz Müller They …
