I suspected that there was some error in the Russian belief, but I did not think of the explanation which you have almost proved to be the true one. It is an extremely interesting instance of a more fertile variety beating out a less fertile one, and, in this case, one much more valuable to man. With respect to publication, I am at a loss to advise you, for I live a secluded life and do not see many periodicals, or hear what is done at the various societies. It seems to me that your paper should be published in some agricultural journal; for it is not simply scientific, and would therefore not be published by the Linnean or Royal Societies.
Would the Royal Agricultural Society be a fitting place? Unfortunately I am not a member, and could not myself present it. Unless you think of some better journal, there is the "Agricultural Gazette": I have occasionally suggested articles for publication to the editor (though personally unknown to me) which he has always accepted.
Permit me again to thank you for the thorough manner in which you have worked out this case; to kill an error is as good a service as, and sometimes even better than, the establishing a new truth or fact.
LETTER 753. TO A. STEPHEN WILSON. Down, February 13th, 1880.
It was very kind of you to send me two numbers of the "Gardeners' Chronicle" with your two articles, which I have read with much interest. (753/1. "Gardeners' Chronicle," 1879, page 652; 1880, pages 108, 173.) You have quite convinced me, whatever Mr. Asher may say to the contrary. I want to ask you a question, on the bare chance of your being able to answer it, but if you cannot, please do not take the trouble to write. The lateral branches of the silver fir often grow out into knobs through the action of a fungus, Aecidium; and from these knobs shoots grow vertically (753/2. The well-known "Witches-Brooms," or "Hexen-Besen," produced by the fungus Aecidium elatinum.) instead of horizontally, like all the other twigs on the same branch. Now the roots of Cruciferae and probably other plants are said to become knobbed through the action of a fungus: now, do these knobs give rise to rootlets? and, if so, do they grow in a new or abnormal direction? (753/3. The parasite is probably Plasmodiophora: in this case no abnormal rootlets have been observed, as far as we know.)
LETTER 754. TO W. THISELTON-DYER. Down, June 18th, 1879.
The plants arrived last night in first-rate order, and it was very very good of you to take so much trouble as to hunt them up yourself. They seem exactly what I wanted, and if I fail it will not be for want of perfect materials. But a confounded painter (I beg his pardon) comes here to-night, and for the next two days I shall be half dead with sitting to him; but after then I will begin to work at the plants and see what I can do, and very curious I am about the results.
I have to thank you for two very interesting letters. I am delighted to hear, and with surprise, that you care about old Erasmus D. God only knows what I shall make of his life--it is such new kind of work to me. (754/1. "Erasmus Darwin." By Ernst Krause. Translated from the German by W.S. Dallas: with a preliminary notice by Charles Darwin. London, 1879. See "Life and Letters," III., pages 218-20.)
Thanks for case of sleeping Crotalaria--new to me. I quite agree to every word you say about Ball's lecture (754/2. "On the Origin of the Flora of the European Alps," "Geogr. Soc. Proc." Volume I., 1879, page 564. See Letter 395, Volume II.)--it is, as you say, like Sir W. Thomson's meteorite. (754/3. In 1871 Lord Kelvin (Presidential Address Brit. Assoc.) suggested that meteorites, "the moss-grown fragments from the ruins of another world," might have introduced life to our planet.) It is really a pity; it is enough to make Geographical Distribution ridiculous in the eyes of the world. Frank will be interested about the Auriculas; I never attended to this plant, for the powder did [not] seem to me like true "bloom." (754/4.