RECORD: Darwin, C. R. [1863]. Draft of a letter to the Gardeners' Chronicle. CUL-DAR70.172. Edited by John van Wyhe (Darwin Online, http://darwin-online.org.uk/)

REVISION HISTORY: Transcribed by Christine Chua and edited by John van Wyhe 8.2021. RN1

NOTE: See record in the Darwin Online manuscript catalogue, enter its Identifier here. Reproduced with permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library and William Huxley Darwin. The volume CUL-DAR70 contains material for Darwin's book Orchids (2d ed. 1877).

Due to illness, the letter was not published.

[172]

Peaches perforated & sucked by moths

Have any of your readers seen moths or butterflies sucking peaches, plums or other fruit, of which the skin was not broken?

A well-known entomologist, Mr Roland Trimen, writes to me from the Cape of Good Hope, that a moth, the [few words faded] has lately swarmed in the province of Natal; & after advancing some indirect evidence that moths are capable of perforating with their delicate proboscis the skin of the peach, he sends me the following extract, together with a sketch of a perforated peach, from a letter written to him by an accomplished lady & botanist.

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Citation: John van Wyhe, ed. 2002-. The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online. (http://darwin-online.org.uk/)

File last updated 26 July, 2023