Today | News | Books | Recipes Adventure | Science Fiction | Ghost stories | Poetry | Children | History Booke weeks' holidays)--only three cases as yet,
I see.
BABINGTON--British Flora.
593 species in genera of 5 and 593 (odd chance equal) in
upwards have in a thousand genera of 3 and downwards have
species presenting vars. in a thousand presenting vars.
134/1000.* 37/1000.
(*53/3. This sentence may be interpreted as follows: The number of
species which present varieties are 134 per thousand in genera of 5 species
and upwards. The result is obtained from tabulation of 593 species.)
HOOKER--New Zealand.
Genera with 4 species and With 3 species and downwards
upwards, 150/1000. 114/1000.
GODRON--Central France.
With 5 species and upwards With 3 species and downwards
160/1000. 105/1000.
I do not enter into details on omitting introduced plants and very
varying genera, as Rubus, Salix, Rosa, etc., which would make the result
more in favour.
I enjoyed seeing Henslow extremely, though I was a good way from well at
the time. Farewell, my dear Hooker: do not forget your visit here some
time.
LETTER 54. TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, November 14th [1857].
On Tuesday I will send off from London, whither I go on that day,
Ledebour's three remaining volumes, Grisebach and Cybele, i.e., all that
I have, and most truly am I obliged to you for them. I find the rule, as
yet, of the species varying most in the large genera universal, except
in Miquel's very brief and therefore imperfect list of the Holland
flora, which makes me very anxious to tabulate a fuller flora of
Holland. I shall remain in London till Friday morning, and if quite
convenient to send me two volumes of D.C. Prodromus, I could take them
home and tabulate them. I should think a volume with a large best known
natural family, and a volume with several small broken families would
be best, always supposing that the varieties are conspicuously marked in
both. Have you the volume published by Lowe on Madeira? If so and if any
varieties are marked I should much like to see it, to see if I can make
out anything about habitats of vars. in so small an area--a point on
which I have become very curious. I fear there is no chance of your
possessing Forbes and Hancock "British Shells," a grand work, which I
much wish to tabulate.
Very many thanks for seed of Adlumia cirrhosa, which I will carefully
observe. My notice in the G. Ch. on Kidney Beans (54.1 "On the Agency
of Bees in the Fertilisation of Papilionaceous Flowers" ("Gardeners'
Chronicle," 1857, page 725).) has brought me a curious letter from an
intelligent gardener, with a most remarkable lot of beans, crossed in a
marvellous manner IN THE FIRST GENERATION, like the peas sent to you by
Berkeley and like those experimentalised on by Gartner and by Wiegmann.
It is a very odd case; I shall sow these seeds and see what comes up.
How very odd that pollen of one form should affect the outer coats and
size of the bean produced by pure species!...
LETTER 55. TO J.D. HOOKER. Down [1857?].
You know how I work subjects: namely, if I stumble on any general
remark, and if I find it confirmed in any other very distinct class,
then I try to find out whether it is true,--if it has any bearing on my
work. The following, perhaps, may be important to me. Dr. Wight remarks
that Cucurbitaceae (55/1. Wight, "Remarks on the Fruit of the Natural
Order Cucurbitaceae" ("Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist." VIII., page 261). R. Wight,
F.R.S. (1796-1872) was Superintendent of the Madras Botanic Garden.)
is a very isolated family, and has very diverging affinities. I find,
strongly put and illustrated, the very same remark in the genera of
hymenoptera. Now, it is not to me at first apparent why a very distinct
and isolated group should be apt to have more divergent affinities than
a less isolated group. I am aware that most genera have more affinities
than in two ways, which latter, perhaps, is the commonest case. I see
how infinitely vague all this is; but I should very much like to know
what you and Mr. Bentham (if he will read this), who have attended so
much to the principles of classification, think of this. Perhaps the
best way would be to think of half a dozen most isolated groups of
plants, and then consider whether the affinities point in an unusual
number of directions. Very likely you may think the whole question too
vague to be worth consideration.
LETTER 56. TO J.D. HOOKER. Down, April 8th [1857].
I now want to ask your opinion, and for facts on a point; and as I shall
often want to do this during the next year or two, so let me say, once
for all, that you must not take trouble out of mere good nature (of
which towards me you have a most abundant stock), but you must consider,
in regard to the trouble any question may take, whether you think it
worth while--as all loss of time so far lessens your original work--to
give me facts to be quoted on your authority in my work. Do not think
I shall be disappointed if you cannot spare time; for already I have
profited enormously from your judgment and knowledge. I earnestly beg
you to act as I suggest, and not take trouble solely out of good-nature.
My point is as follows: Harvey gives the case of Fucus varying
remarkably, and yet in same way under most different conditions. D. Don
makes same remark in regard to Juncus bufonius in England and India.
Polygala vulgaris has white, red, and blue flowers in Faroe, England,
and I think Herbert says in Zante. Now such cases seem to me very
striking, as showing how little relation some variations have to
climatal conditions.
Do you think there are many such cases? Does Oxalis corniculata present
exactly the same varieties under very different climates?
How is it with any other British plants in New Zealand, or at the foot
of the Himalaya? Will you think over this and let me hear the result?
One other question: do you remember whether the introduced Sonchus in
New Zealand was less, equally, or more common than the aboriginal stock
of the same species, where both occurred together? I forget whether
there is any other case parallel with this curious one of the Sonchus...
I have been making good, though slow, progress with my book, for facts
have been falling nicely into groups, enlightening each other.
LETTER 57. TO T.H. HUXLEY. Moor Park, Farnham, Surrey [1857?].
Your letter has been forwarded to me here, where I am profiting by a
few weeks' rest and hydropathy. Your letter has interested and amused me
much. I am extremely glad you have taken up the Aphis (57/1. Professor
Huxley's paper on the organic reproduction of Aphis is in the "Trans.
Linn. Soc." XXII. (1858), page 193. Prof. Owen had treated the subject
in his introductory Hunterian lecture "On Parthenogenesis" (1849).
His theory cannot be fully given here. Briefly, he holds that
parthenogenesis is due to the inheritance of a "remnant of spermatic
virtue": when the "spermatic force" or "virtue" is exhausted fresh
impregnation occurs. Huxley severely criticises both Owen's facts and
his theory.) question, but, for Heaven's sake, do not come th |