To Leonard Jenyns 17 October [1846]
Summary
Comments on LJ’s Observations [in natural history (1846)].
Discusses variation among British birds, and the conflicting treatment of bird species by C. W. L. Gloger and C. L. Brehm.
Describes collecting incident of his student days involving Carabus.
Mentions squirrels eating insects.
Astonished to hear of terrestrial Planaria.
Comments on BAAS meeting in Southampton.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 17 Oct [1846] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1009 |
To Leonard Jenyns 21 [January 1847]
Summary
Acknowledges receipt of [The naturalist’s pocket] almanack edited by LJ. Suggests some improvements.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 21 [Jan 1847] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-1055 |
From Leonard Blomefield 12 March 1877
Summary
Congratulates CD on testimonials from the savants of Germany and the Netherlands [Nature 15 (1877): 356, 410–12] and generally on his contributions to biology.
Asks if and when CD’s "Variability of organic beings in a state of nature", as projected in 1868 [see Variation 1: 4] is to appear.
Author: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 12 Mar 1877 |
Classmark: | DAR 168: 59 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-10889 |
To Leonard Blomefield 13 March 1877
Summary
CD doubts that he will be able to do much more that is new, but cannot bear idleness. Has great amount of material on variation under nature, but so much has been published since the appearance of the Origin that he doubts he has the power of mind to render the mass into a digested whole.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 13 Mar 1877 |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution (L16163.017b) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-10891 |
From Leonard Jenyns [before 18 April 1858]
Author: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | [before 18 Apr 1858] |
Classmark: | DAR 45: 20–4 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2250 |
To Leonard Jenyns 1 April [1858]
Summary
Thanks LJ for his book [Observations in meteorology (1858)].
CD has been working on his species book [Natural selection].
Has become dreadfully heterodox on immutability of species.
His work on pigeons: variation under domestication throws the greatest light on variation in a state of nature.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 1 Apr [1858] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2251 |
To Leonard Jenyns 9 April [1858]
Summary
Asks LJ to lend him a copy of his paper ["Variation of species", Rep. BAAS 26 (1856): 101–5] and any notes or references he has. Although CD has a large accumulation of facts, it is impossible to see and consider too many.
His health is poor.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 9 Apr [1858] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2253 |
To Leonard Jenyns 18 April [1858]
Summary
Thanks LJ for his MS [of "Variation of species", Rep. BAAS 26 (1856): 101–5].
Will read it at his hydropathic establishment [Moor Park], where he is going for a rest.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 18 Apr [1858] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2259 |
To Leonard Jenyns [28 April 1858]
Summary
Returns MS [of "Variation of species"]; several facts were new to him, especially interested in wagtails.
Wishes he could swallow Florent Prévost on sparrows ["Du régime alimentaire des oiseaux", C. R. Hebd. Acad. Sci. 46 (1858): 136–8].
LJ’s facts seem to bear out CD’s conclusion that secondary sexual characters were most variable of all.
Explains how he intends to deal with variation, and general facts in natural history in the light of species theory. Can only afford one chapter on variation in nature. It seems more important to make out variation in domestic animals.
Asks for facts on birds’ nests for his chapter on instincts.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | [28 Apr 1858] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2264 |
To Leonard Jenyns 13 November [1859]
Summary
Invites criticisms of his book [Origin] which is "only an abstract & very much condensed". Knows LJ will not agree with the lengths to which CD goes. It took long years to convert CD, but he cannot persuade himself "that a theory which explains … several large classes of facts, can be wholly wrong".
Hopes to publish his full MS if he ever gets strong enough.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 13 Nov [1859] |
Classmark: | Scriptorium (dealers) (1981) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2528 |
DCP-LETT-2530
Summary
Cancelled: same as 2528. Invites criticisms of his book [Origin] which is "only an abstract & very much condensed". Knows LJ will not agree with the lengths to which CD goes. It took long years to convert CD, but he cannot persuade himself "that a theory which explains … several large classes of facts, can be wholly wrong".
Hopes to publish his full MS if he ever gets strong enough.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 13 Nov [1859] |
Classmark: | LL 2: 219 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2530 |
From Leonard Jenyns 4 January 1860
Summary
Has read Origin and considers it one of the most valuable contributions to present-day natural history. Believes, however, that there are difficulties in the extensive generalisation that all taxonomic groups are related by descent. Does not understand how Genesis is to be read unless at least the human species was created independently of other animals. Cannot bring himself to the idea that man’s reasoning and moral sense could have been obtained from "irrational progenitors": the "Divine Image" is the unsurmountable distinction between man and brutes. [See 2644.]
Author: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 4 Jan 1860 |
Classmark: | The University of Edinburgh Centre for Research Collections (Lyell collection Coll-203/A3/5: 95–103) |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2637A |
To Leonard Jenyns 7 January [1860]
Summary
Thanks LJ for his letter on Origin. Finds LJ agrees with him more than CD had expected.
Discusses problems of geological record, single primordial form, and man.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 7 Jan [1860] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-2644 |
From Leonard Jenyns 31 December 1861
Summary
Thanks CD for his contribution to the memoir of Henslow [L. Jenyns, Memoir of the Rev. John Stevens Henslow (1862)].
Author: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 31 Dec 1861 |
Classmark: | DAR 168: 56 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3355 |
From Leonard Jenyns 22 January [1862]
Summary
Sends proof-sheets of CD’s contribution to LJ’s Memoir of Henslow.
Author: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 22 Jan [1862] |
Classmark: | DAR 168: 55 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3406 |
To Leonard Jenyns 24 January [1862]
Summary
CD has sent to printer proofs of his contribution to Memoir of Henslow.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 24 Jan [1862] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3410 |
To Leonard Jenyns 10 April [1837]
Summary
Discusses possibility of publishing the zoology of the voyage of the Beagle. Will need help from more able naturalists. Would LJ object to describing the fishes for such a work rather than for scientific journals? Is working on his Beagle journal.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 10 Apr [1837] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-354 |
To Leonard Jenyns 24 May [1862]
Summary
Thanks LJ for Memoir of Henslow; thinks it will be invaluable as an example to other clergymen.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 24 May [1862] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3569 |
From Leonard Jenyns 28 May 1862
Summary
Pleased with CD’s opinion of the Henslow Memoir [L. Jenyns, Memoir of the Rev. John Stevens Henslow (1862)]
Author: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Addressee: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Date: | 28 May 1862 |
Classmark: | DAR 168: 57 |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-3573 |
To Leonard Jenyns 3 December [1837]
Summary
CD is glad LJ is describing the fishes [for Zoology]; would not have permitted J. E. Gray to describe them. New species will be lithographed.
Suggests books; offers coloured drawings made by artist on Beagle voyage.
Author: | Charles Robert Darwin |
Addressee: | Leonard Jenyns; Leonard Blomefield |
Date: | 3 Dec [1837] |
Classmark: | Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institution |
Letter no: | DCP-LETT-391 |
Darwin, C. R. | (33) |
Blomefield, Leonard | (9) |
Jenyns, Leonard | (9) |
Blomefield, Leonard | (33) |
Jenyns, Leonard | (33) |
Darwin, C. R. | (9) |
Blomefield, Leonard | (42) |
Darwin, C. R. | (42) |
Jenyns, Leonard | (42) |