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DARWIN, Charles (1809-1882). Letter signed (‘Charles Darwin’) to [Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Claus: ‘Dear Sir’], Down [House], Beckenham, Kent, 9 July 1876.
DARWIN, Charles (1809-1882). Letter signed (‘Charles Darwin’) to [Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Claus: ‘Dear Sir’], Down [House], Beckenham, Kent, 9 July 1876. 2 pages, 201 x 127mm, bifolium. ‘I am particularly anxious to see what you say on the development and genealogy of the Crustacea’: Darwin writes to the German zoologist Carl Claus, working in an area in which Darwin had a particular interest. Thanking Claus for his kind gift – ‘Your book looks remarkably handsome, & I never saw anything more admirable than the plates at the end’ – Darwin notes that, despite his difficulties with the German language, ‘I am particularly anxious to see what you say on the development and genealogy of the Crustacea, and on the position of the Cirrepedia [sic]. Allow me to assure you that I feel very strongly the great honour of your dedication to me of so great a work’. The German zoologist Carl Friedrich Wilhelm Claus (1835-1899) had been in contact with Darwin for almost a decade by the time of this letter’s writing; Darwin’s interests ranged across the spectrum of geology, zoology and botany, and he first began exchanging letters with Claus, then at the University of Marburg, in 1869, when Claus was working on barnacle morphology and embryology and examining some of the same species that Darwin had investigated in depth. Although Darwin's area of study had since shifted, he maintained an interest in the younger man and appreciation for his work that Claus evidently reciprocated: Darwin had given his assent for Claus to dedicate the work referenced here, Untersuchungen zur Erforschung der Genealogischen Grundlage des Crustaceen Systems , to him a letter of the 2 May that year.