Charles Darwin | The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication. London, 1868, first edition, first issue

Charles Darwin

The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication. London: John Murray, 1868

FIRST EDITION, FIRST ISSUE, 2 volumes, 8vo (222 x 143mm.), ownership inscription to front free endpaper, 43 woodcut illustrations throughout, 5 errata (in 6 lines) on page vi of Volume I, 9 errata (in 7 lines) on page viii of Volume II, 32 pages of publisher's advertisements, dated April 1867, at rear of Volume I, 2 pages of publisher's advertisements, dated February 1868, at rear of Volume II, publisher's green cloth, covers stamped in blind, spine gilt-lettered, dark green coated endpapers, both volumes: light spotting and browning at extremities, extremities rubbed

The first appearance of the phrase "survival of the fittest" in any of Darwin's works. The present text provides a "full statement of the facts on which the theories of the 'Origin' were based" (ODNB). A large part of the book contains details and discussion about artificial selection, and it also contains Darwin's provisional hypothesis of pangenesis ─ one which he thought was new but was in fact not. It is his longest, most substantial work. "This represents the only section of Darwin's big book on the origin of the species which was printed in his lifetime and corresponds to its first two intended chapters" (Freeman). 

PROVENANCE:

Henry Wm Bunbury

LITERATURE:

Freeman 877