The red notebook of Charles Darwin / edited, with an introduction and notes by Sandra Herbert.

  • Charles Darwin
Date:
1980
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Credit: The red notebook of Charles Darwin / edited, with an introduction and notes by Sandra Herbert. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    131/184 (page 117)
    NOTES 117 had in mind other mockingbirds he collected in South America and the Galápagos Islands. Continental forms included Mimus patagonicus, the Patagonian Mockingbird (specimens 1461 and 1620), and Mimus thenca, the Chilean Mockingbird (specimen 2169). The Galápagos forms included: Nesomimus trifasciatus (Gould, 1837) which Darwin collected on Charles Island (specimen 3306), Nesomimus parvulus (Gould, 1837) which Darwin collected at i\lbemarle Island (specimen 3349), and Nesomimus melanotis (Gould 1837) which Darwin collected at Chatham Island (specimen 3307). The British Museum (Natural History) at Tring owns these specimens which, however, no longer bear Darwin's original labels. Classification of the Galápagos forms is from Michael Harris, A Field Guide to the Birds of Galapagos (London, 1974), the most recent treatment of these birds. The only point bearing on Darwin's speci¬ mens where Harris's grouping of the birds differs from that of Gould is with respect to the mockingbird of James Island. Harris places the mockingbirds on James Island with those of Albemarle Island; Gould placed them with the group on Chatham Island. For further discussion of all six mockingbirds described in this note, including plates on the three Galápagos species, see Gould, The Zoology of the Voyage of H.M.S. Beagle. Part III: Birds, pp. 60-64. Also see 'Darwin's Ornithological Notes'; JR, pp. 62-63, 461 ; and Gould's report on the three Galápagos species in Proceedings of the Zoological Society of London, vol. 5 (1837), p. 27. 160 'C' of 'Crust' is written over an 'f. 161 William J. Burchell (1782-1863), English naturahst; personal communication. Burchell's Travels in the Interior of Southern Africa, vol. 2, p. 207 is quoted on the subject of the large size of South African animals compared to animals from other continents in J'T?, p. 101. 162 William J. Burchell (note 161), personal communication. See GS A, p. 3: Mr. Burchell informs me, that he collected at Santos (lat. 24° S.) oyster-shells, apparently recent, some miles from the shore, and quite above the tidal action. During his South American travels of 1825-1829 Burchell made extensive zoological and botanical collections but never published significantly on them in later life. In this paragraph Burchell's name is written in light brown ink above the line, which would indicate a later dating than other entries on the page. Capt. Robert Fitzroy (note 27), personal communication. See also Ji?, pp. 266- 267: I have heard Captain FitzRoy remark, that on entering any of these channels [at Tierra del Fuego] from the outer coast, it is always necessary to look out directly for anchorage; for further inland the depth soon becomes extremely great. Charles Lyell (note 3), personal communication. The reference is to Leopold von Buch, Description physique des îles Canaries (Paris, 1836), p. 428: Ces émanations sulfureuses paraissent donner aux volcans de Java un caractère tout particulier qui n'appartient certainement pas avec le même degré d'intensité et de fréquence à la plupart des autres volcans de la surface du globe. See GSA, pp. 238-239.