The Life and Letters-1 [213]
same species of terrestrial productions on the oceanic islands. Land mollusca drive me mad, and I cannot anyhow get their eggs to experimentise their power of floating and resistance to the injurious action of salt water. I will not apologise for writing so much about my own doings, as I believe you will like to hear. Do sometime, I beg you, let me hear how you get on in health; and IF SO INCLINED, let me have some words on call-ducks.
My dear Fox, yours affectionately, CH. DARWIN.
[With regard to his book he wrote (November 10th) to Sir Charles Lyell:
"I am working very steadily at my big book; I have found it quite impossible to publish any preliminary essay or sketch; but am doing my work as completely as my present materials allow without waiting to perfect them. And this much acceleration I owe to you."]
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, Sunday [October 1856].
My dear Hooker,
The seeds are come all safe, many thanks for them. I was very sorry to run away so soon and miss any part of my MOST pleasant evening; and I ran away like a Goth and Vandal without wishing Mrs. Hooker good-bye; but I was only just in time, as I got on the platform the train had arrived.
I was particularly glad of our discussion after dinner, fighting a battle with you always clears my mind wonderfully. I groan to hear that A. Gray agrees with you about the condition of Botanical Geography. All I know is that if you had had to search for light in Zoological Geography you would by contrast, respect your own subject a vast deal more than you now do. The hawks have behaved like gentlemen, and have cast up pellets with lots of seeds in them; and I have just had a parcel of partridge's feet well caked with mud!!! (The mud in such cases often contains seeds, so that plants are thus transported.) Adios.
Your insane and perverse friend, C. DARWIN.
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, November 4th [1856].
My dear Hooker,
I thank you more CORDIALLY than you will think probable, for your note. Your verdict (On the MS. relating to geographical distribution.) has been a great relief. On my honour I had no idea whether or not you would say it was (and I knew you would say it very kindly) so bad, that you would have begged me to have burnt the whole. To my own mind my MS. relieved me of some few difficulties, and the difficulties seemed to me pretty fairly stated, but I had become so bewildered with conflicting facts, evidence, reasoning and opinions, that I felt to myself that I had lost all judgment. Your general verdict is INCOMPARABLY more favourable than I had anticipated...
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, November 23rd [1856].
My dear Hooker,
I fear I shall weary you with letters, but do not answer this, for in truth and without flattery, I so value your letters, that after a heavy batch, as of late, I feel that I have been extravagant and have drawn too much money, and shall therefore have to stint myself on another occasion.
When I sent my MS. I felt strongly that some preliminary questions on the causes of variation ought to have been sent you. Whether I am right or wrong in these points is quite a separate question, but the conclusion which I have come to, quite independently of geographical distribution, is that external conditions (to which naturalists so often appeal) do by themselves VERY LITTLE. How much they do is the point of all others on which I feel myself very weak. I judge from the facts of variation under domestication, and I may yet get more light. But at present, after drawing up a rough copy on this subject, my conclusion is that external conditions do EXTREMELY little, except in causing mere variability. This mere variability (causing the child NOT closely to resemble its parent) I look at as VERY different from the formation of a marked variety or new species. (No doubt the variability is governed by laws, some of which I am endeavouring very obscurely to trace.) The formation of a strong variety or species I look a as almost wholly due to the selection
My dear Fox, yours affectionately, CH. DARWIN.
[With regard to his book he wrote (November 10th) to Sir Charles Lyell:
"I am working very steadily at my big book; I have found it quite impossible to publish any preliminary essay or sketch; but am doing my work as completely as my present materials allow without waiting to perfect them. And this much acceleration I owe to you."]
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, Sunday [October 1856].
My dear Hooker,
The seeds are come all safe, many thanks for them. I was very sorry to run away so soon and miss any part of my MOST pleasant evening; and I ran away like a Goth and Vandal without wishing Mrs. Hooker good-bye; but I was only just in time, as I got on the platform the train had arrived.
I was particularly glad of our discussion after dinner, fighting a battle with you always clears my mind wonderfully. I groan to hear that A. Gray agrees with you about the condition of Botanical Geography. All I know is that if you had had to search for light in Zoological Geography you would by contrast, respect your own subject a vast deal more than you now do. The hawks have behaved like gentlemen, and have cast up pellets with lots of seeds in them; and I have just had a parcel of partridge's feet well caked with mud!!! (The mud in such cases often contains seeds, so that plants are thus transported.) Adios.
Your insane and perverse friend, C. DARWIN.
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, November 4th [1856].
My dear Hooker,
I thank you more CORDIALLY than you will think probable, for your note. Your verdict (On the MS. relating to geographical distribution.) has been a great relief. On my honour I had no idea whether or not you would say it was (and I knew you would say it very kindly) so bad, that you would have begged me to have burnt the whole. To my own mind my MS. relieved me of some few difficulties, and the difficulties seemed to me pretty fairly stated, but I had become so bewildered with conflicting facts, evidence, reasoning and opinions, that I felt to myself that I had lost all judgment. Your general verdict is INCOMPARABLY more favourable than I had anticipated...
CHARLES DARWIN TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, November 23rd [1856].
My dear Hooker,
I fear I shall weary you with letters, but do not answer this, for in truth and without flattery, I so value your letters, that after a heavy batch, as of late, I feel that I have been extravagant and have drawn too much money, and shall therefore have to stint myself on another occasion.
When I sent my MS. I felt strongly that some preliminary questions on the causes of variation ought to have been sent you. Whether I am right or wrong in these points is quite a separate question, but the conclusion which I have come to, quite independently of geographical distribution, is that external conditions (to which naturalists so often appeal) do by themselves VERY LITTLE. How much they do is the point of all others on which I feel myself very weak. I judge from the facts of variation under domestication, and I may yet get more light. But at present, after drawing up a rough copy on this subject, my conclusion is that external conditions do EXTREMELY little, except in causing mere variability. This mere variability (causing the child NOT closely to resemble its parent) I look at as VERY different from the formation of a marked variety or new species. (No doubt the variability is governed by laws, some of which I am endeavouring very obscurely to trace.) The formation of a strong variety or species I look a as almost wholly due to the selection