The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online

RECORD: Darwin, C. R. [1842]. Enclosure to Charles Stokes on Fungia. NYPL-Berg-Coll-MSS-Darwin[.4]. (Cite as: John van Wyhe ed., 2002-. The Complete Work of Charles Darwin Online, http://darwin-online.org.uk/)

NOTE: See record in the Darwin Online manuscript catalogue, enter its Identifier here. Reproduced with permission of William Huxley Darwin. This notes is in the New York Public Library, Henry W. and Albert A. Berg Collection of English and American Literature.

This is the missing enclosure to Darwin to Charles Stokes [1839 – September 1842], Correspondence vol. 2, p. 153. Which should probably be re-dated to January–March 1842 considering another letter from Darwin to Stokes (Correspondence, vol. 7 Supplement). Charles Stokes (c.1784-1853) was a stockbroker in London as well as a naturalist.

Darwin's brief letter reads: "My dear Stokes | I send you my few observations of Fungia, exactly as I made them, with merely corrections of arrangement & style: my comparisons with Actinia & Caryophyllia were written on the spot.— Pray be so kind as to make any improvements in style or names of parts as you think fit | Believe me | Most truly Yours | C. Darwin 12 Upper Gower St". The editors of the Correspondence noted "CD had consulted Stokes before sailing in the Beagle. In his list of suggestions from various naturalists, CD noted: '…'Species of Fungias. ascertain from fleshy parts; & propagation: found in shallow water: Mr Stokes.—' (DAR 29.3: 78). No descriptions of CD's Fungia specimens have been found."

The enclosure refers to a specimen of Fungia, or mushroom coral, a genus of solitary reef-inhabiting stony coral that Darwin collected on the reef at Tahiti in November 1835 during the voyage of the Beagle. Actiniaria is a sea anemone. Caryophyllia is a genus of solitary corals.

See Darwin, 1835. Zoological diary: Tahiti. CUL-DAR31.345 Text & image and Zoology Notes, p. 301. See also Sponsel, Darwin's evolving identity, pp. 71-2 and van Wyhe, Charles Darwin on Tahiti. PDF

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At Tahiti I kept (Nov.^r 1835) a specimen of the common Fungia which lives in shallow water, for some little time alive. When the animal was left undisturbed in a vessel of water a fleshy substance filled up the interstices between the vertical stony plates or rays, so that the whole upper surface was ~~nearly~~ nearly smooth when touched, this fleshy substance was ~~either~~ drawn either deeply down between the plates or towards the central orifice; its power of contraction or movement was considerable.

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Each t arm or tentaculum is placed directly over the inner & rounded angle of a ray; and as the rays at the circumference extend unequal distances towards the centre, the whole upper surface of the coral is scattered sprinkled with tentacula; but they are not numerous towards the circumference. ~~There are~~ Altogether there are as many tentacula as rays. The tentacula are short and terminate in slightly enlarged heads; they are sometimes distended with water; they are highly sensitive; when one is touched the

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whole soft part of the animal contracts. From the position of the greater number of the tentacles near the circumference, th from their shortness, I do not suppose they are capable of conveying food towards the central orifice, even if aided by the fleshy parts contracting towards the same point. Vessels could be seen within the fleshy substance leading from the base of each tentaculum towards the central orifice.

The central orifice in general appearance exactly resembles that of an Actinia; it is internally

[annotation in another hand:] C Darwin Fungia

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plated, ~~or folded~~. Within this cavity of the central orifice thin & complicated folds of a soft delicate substance could be seen in motion, precisely like those within the central orifice of a Caryophillia: similar folds were ~~protruded~~ protruded from some parts of the fleshy substance between the rays, where it had been injured & cut.

C. Darwin

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