By Descent: the Property of the Hooker Family

Charles Darwin, William Jackson Hooker

Autograph letter signed from Darwin to Charles Lyell, 💝autograph letter from Hooker to Darwin, plus associated ephemera

i. Autograph letter signed, [9 April 1873], from Charles Darwin to Charles Lyell, expressing Darwin's hope that Lyell has "enjoyed [his] excursion to Ludlow in Shropshire", regretting that the weather in London has not been "favourable as far as I can remember" and informing Lyell that he "did not hear that you were off till you were gone", 1 page, 8vo, paper headed "Down | Beckenham, Kent", previously folded, slightly creased at folds, traces of old mount on verso of final leaf

Charles Lyell, 1st Baronet (1797-1875) was a Scottish geologist whose Principles of Geology (1830-1833), Elements of Geology (1838), and Antiquity of Man (1836) appeared in many editions (Darwin Correspondence Project). A Professor of Geology at King's Col❀lege London and President of the Geological Society (1835-1837 and 1849-1851), Lyell was also Darwin's scientific mentor and friend. Lyell's excursion to Ludlow alongside his wife Mary Elizabeth is mentioned in a letter of April 25 to Darwin from J.D. Hooker (not part of th♚is lot). Mary Elizabeth died suddenly of typhoid on April 24 during this very trip, her condition deteriorating suddenly from her first arrival in Shropshire.

ii. Autograph letter, from William Jackson Hooker to Charles Darwin, informing Darwin that he "read yesterday the notes on Bond Island which I owe to you", questioning whether there was "ever such an enigma" and expressing his excitement about the local flora and fauna ("...above everything such a proposition of individual monocototyledons!"); Hooker also notes that the ecological conditions do not seem very different from the Galapagos Islands, and expresses his amazement, both that "many monocotyledons [should] have come here" and why they survived "more there than on the main island if once connected", 4 pages, 8vo, first leaf with blindstamp of Royal Gardens Kew, creased where folded previously

"The geographical distribution of plants was a central concern for Hooker. He was puzzled, for example, by the species he had seen growing on widely scattered islands; like other naturalists he wondered how they had got there. One option was simply to assume that God had created them several times in their existing locations, but Hooker rejected this theory of multiple centres of creation, and sought a more law-like explanation. He assumed that each species had been created (by an unknown means) at a single time and place from where it had spread. However, this did not explain how species travelled over huge expanses of ocean" (ODNB).

iii. Autograph of Charles Darwin, on small scrap of paper, old tape to verso

iv. Portrait of Charles Darwin on silver print postcard, 124 x 85mm., light spotting and adhesive residue from old mount to verso

LITERATURE:

Autograph letter to Charles Lyell: Darwin Correspondence Project, letter number 8552F (), also published in Burkhardt et al., eds., The Correspondence of Charles Darwin (CUP, 1985)