- 15
Darwin, Charles.
Description
- The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication. John Murray, 1868
- PAPER
Biographical Sketch of an Infant. [offprint from] Mind A Quarterly Review. No. 7. July 1877, also presentation copy from Darwin to Henrietta, inscribed in the hand of the recipient ("H.E. Litchfield | from C. Darwin"), 6 leaves, pamphlet, originally pinned to advertisement leaf at the end of volume 1of work above, some slight spotting, pin-holes
Provenance
Literature
Condition
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Catalogue Note
A highly important family presentation and annotated copy, apparently marked up under authorial supervision for the extensively altered second edition of 1875. Variation under Domestication, corresponding to the first two intended chapters, was the only section of Darwin's expanded work on the origin of species which was published in his lifetime, and is in essence a full statement of the facts on which the theories of the Origin were based. It took Darwin many years to write, and provides overwhelming evidence for the ubiquity of variation in the natural world, as well as offering up his provisional hypothesis of pangenesis, aiming to explain how heritable traits were passed from parents to offspring. It is the first time that the phrase "survival of the fittest" appears in Darwin's published work. This first issue was published on 30 January 1868. Demand from the reading public was extraordinarily and unexpectedly strong, with all copies sold within a week. A second issue appeared in February.
Darwin drew upon many members of his immediate family for assistance with his research and the writing of his books. On the female side his wife Emma copied out his manuscripts and checked proofs, while Henrietta, as evidenced here, worked as a trusted editor. Comparison with the 1875 edition suggests that this, at least, was one of the copies of the first edition which Henrietta used, under guidance or possibly dictation from her father, to prepare new copy. The inserted manuscript revision in Henrietta's hand opposite p.108, for instance, dealing with the domestic rabbit, almost matches the beginning of the new paragraph in the later edition: "108 | We come now to the Himalayan | breed somtimes called | Chinese, Polish or Russian. | These pretty rabbits etc". Emma would go on to edit The Descent of Man, The Expression of the Emotions in Man in Animals, and Coral Reefs.
The remarkable Biographical Sketch of an Infant was written up by Darwin from close observations in his diary of his first-born son William Erasmus, from 1839-41. The editor of a modern reprint has observed that Darwin "conquered...most of developmental psychology in a single sweep" (C. Ounstead, 1971).