Volume I Part 22 (2/2)

I have just finished No. 1 of the ”Natural History Review,” and must congratulate you, as chiefly concerned, on its excellence. The whole seems to me admirable,--so admirable that it is impossible that other numbers should be so good, but it would be foolish to expect it. I am rather a croaker, and I do rather fear that the merit of the articles will be above the run of common readers and subscribers. I have been much interested by your brain article. (119/2. The ”Brain article” of Huxley bore the t.i.tle ”On the Zoological Relations of Man with the Lower Animals,” and appeared in No. 1, January 1861, page 67. It was Mr.

Huxley's vindication of the unqualified contradiction given by him at the Oxford meeting of the British a.s.sociation to Professor Owen's a.s.sertions as to the difference between the brains of man and the higher apes. The sentence omitted by Owen in his lecture before the University of Cambridge was a footnote on the close structural resemblance between h.o.m.o and Pithecus, which occurs in his paper on the characters of the cla.s.s Mammalia in the ”Linn. Soc. Journal,” Volume II., 1857, page 20.

According to Huxley the lecture, or ”Essay on the Cla.s.sification of the Mammalia,” was, with this omission, a reprint of the Linnean paper. In ”Man's Place in Nature,” page 110, note, Huxley remarks: ”Surely it is a little singular that the 'anatomist,' who finds it 'difficult' to 'determine the difference' between h.o.m.o and Pithecus, should yet range them, on anatomical grounds, in distinct sub-cla.s.ses.”) What a complete and awful smasher (and done like a ”b.u.t.tered angel”) it is for Owen!

What a humbug he is to have left out the sentence in the lecture before the orthodox Cambridge dons! I like Lubbock's paper very much: how well he writes. (119/3. Sir John Lubbock's paper was a review of Leydig on the Daphniidae. M'Donnell's was ”On the h.o.m.ologies of the Electric Organ of the Torpedo,” afterwards used in the ”Origin” (see Edition VI., page 150).) M'Donnell, of course, pleases me greatly. But I am very curious to know who wrote the Protozoa article: I shall hear, if it be not a secret, from Lubbock. It strikes me as very good, and, by Jove, how Owen is shown up--”this great and sound reasoner”! By the way, this reminds me of a pa.s.sage which I have just observed in Owen's address at Leeds, which a clever reviewer might turn into good fun. He defines (page xc) and further on amplifies his definition that creation means ”a process he knows not what.” And in a previous sentence he says facts shake his confidence that the Apteryx in New Zealand and Red Grouse in England are ”distinct creations.” So that he has no confidence that these birds were produced by ”processes he knows not what!” To what miserable inconsistencies and rubbish this truckling to opposite opinions leads the great generaliser! (119/4. In the ”Historical Sketch,” which forms part of the later editions of the ”Origin,” Mr. Darwin made use of Owen's Leeds Address in the manner sketched above. See ”Origin,” Edition VI., page xvii.)

Farewell: I heartily rejoice in the clear merit of this number. I hope Mrs. Huxley goes on well. Etty keeps much the same, but has not got up to the same pitch as when you were here. Farewell.

LETTER 120. TO JAMES LAMONT. Down, February 25th [1861].

I am extremely much obliged for your very kind present of your beautiful work, ”Seasons with the Sea-Horses;” and I have no doubt that I shall find much interesting from so careful and acute an observer as yourself.

(120/1. ”Seasons with the Sea-Horses; or, Sporting Adventures in the Northern Seas.” London, 1861. Mr. Lamont (loc. cit., page 273) writes: ”The polar bear seems to me to be nothing more than a variety of the bears inhabiting Northern Europe, Asia, and America; and it surely requires no very great stretch of the imagination to suppose that this variety was originally created, not as we see him now, but by individuals of Ursus arctos in Siberia, who, finding their means of subsistence running short, and pressed by hunger, ventured on the ice and caught some seals. These individuals would find that they could make a subsistence in this way, and would take up their residence on the sh.o.r.e and gradually take to a life on the ice...Then it stands to reason that those individuals who might happen to be palest in colour would have the best chance of succeeding in surprising seals...The process of Natural Selection would do the rest, and Ursus arctos would in the course of a few thousands, or a few millions of years, be transformed into the variety at present known as Ursus maritimus.” The author adds the following footnote (op. cit., page 275): ”It will be obvious to any one that I follow Mr. Darwin in these remarks; and, although the substance of this chapter was written in Spitzbergen, before ”The Origin of Species” was published, I do not claim any originality for my views; and I also cheerfully acknowledge that, but for the publication of that work in connection with the name of so distinguished a naturalist, I never would have ventured to give to the world my own humble opinions on the subject.”)

P.S. I have just been cutting the leaves of your book, and have been very much pleased and surprised at your note about what you wrote in Spitzbergen. As you thought it out independently, it is no wonder that you so clearly understand Natural Selection, which so few of my reviewers do or pretend not to do.

I never expected to see any one so heroically bold as to defend my bear ill.u.s.tration. (120/2. ”In North America the black bear was seen by Hearne swimming for hours with widely open mouth, thus catching, almost like a whale, insects in the water.”--”Origin,” Edition VI., page 141.

See Letter 110.) But a man who has done all that you have done must be bold! It is laughable how often I have been attacked and misrepresented about this bear. I am much pleased with your remarks, and thank you cordially for coming to the rescue.

LETTER 121. TO W.B. TEGETMEIER.

(121/1. Mr. Darwin's letters to Mr. Tegetmeier, taken as a whole, give a striking picture of the amount of a.s.sistance which Darwin received from him during many years. Some citations from these letters given in ”Life and Letters,” II., pages 52, 53, show how freely and generously Mr.

Tegetmeier gave his help, and how much his co-operation was valued.

The following letter is given as an example of the questions on which Darwin sought Mr. Tegetmeier's opinion and guidance.)

Down, March 22 [1861].

I ought to have answered your last note sooner; but I have been very busy. How wonderfully successful you have been in breeding Pouters! You have a good right to be proud of your accuracy of eye and judgment. I am in the thick of poultry, having just commenced, and shall be truly grateful for the skulls, if you can send them by any conveyance to the Nag's Head next Thursday.

You ask about vermilion wax: positively it was not in the state of comb, but in solid bits and cakes, which were thrown with other rubbish not far from my hives. You can make any use of the fact you like. Combs could be concentrically and variously coloured and dates recorded by giving for a few days wax darkly coloured with vermilion and indigo, and I daresay other substances. You ask about my crossed fowls, and this leads me to make a proposition to you, which I hope cannot be offensive to you. I trust you know me too well to think that I would propose anything objectionable to the best of my judgment. The case is this: for my object of treating poultry I must give a sketch of several breeds, with remarks on various points. I do not feel strong on the subject.

Now, when my MS. is fairly copied in an excellent handwriting, would you read it over, which would take you at most an hour or two, and make comments in pencil on it; and accept, like a barrister, a fee, we will say, of a couple of guineas. This would be a great a.s.sistance to me, specially if you would allow me to put a note, stating that you, a distinguished judge and fancier, had read it over. I would state that you doubted or concurred, as each case might be, of course striking out what you were sure was incorrect. There would be little new in my MS. to you; but if by chance you used any of my facts or conclusions before I published, I should wish you to state that they were on my authority; otherwise I shall be accused of stealing from you. There will be little new, except that perhaps I have consulted some out-of-the-way books, and have corresponded with some good authorities. Tell me frankly what you think of this; but unless you will oblige me by accepting remuneration, I cannot and will not give you such trouble. I have little doubt that several points will arise which will require investigation, as I care for many points disregarded by fanciers; and according to any time thus spent, you will, I trust, allow me to make remuneration. I hope that you will grant me this favour. There is one a.s.sistance which I will now venture to beg of you--viz., to get me, if you can, another specimen of an old white Angora rabbit. I want it dead for the skeleton; and not knocked on the head. Secondly, I see in the ”Cottage Gardener” (March 19th, page 375) there are impure half-lops with one ear quite upright and shorter than the other lopped ear. I much want a dead one. Baker cannot get one. Baily is looking out; but I want two specimens. Can you a.s.sist me, if you meet any rabbit-fancier? I have had rabbits with one ear more lopped than the other; but I want one with one ear quite upright and shorter, and the other quite long and lopped.

LETTER 122. TO H.W. BATES. Down, March 26th [1861].

I have read your papers with extreme interest, and I have carefully read every word of them. (122/1. ”Contributions to an Insect Fauna of the Amazon Valley.” (Read March 5th and November 24th, 1860). ”Entomological Soc. Trans.” V., pages 223 and 335).) They seem to me to be far richer in facts of variation, and especially on the distribution of varieties and subspecies, than anything which I have read. Hereafter I shall re-read them, and hope in my future work to profit by them and make use of them. The amount of variation has much surprised me. The a.n.a.logous variation of distinct species in the same regions strikes me as particularly curious. The greater variability of the female s.e.x is new to me. Your Guiana case seems in some degree a.n.a.logous, as far as plants are concerned, with the modern plains of La Plata, which seem to have been colonised from the north, but the species have been hardly modified. (122/2. Mr. Bates (page 349) gives reason to believe that the Guiana region should be considered ”a perfectly independent province,”

and that it has formed a centre ”whence radiated the species which now people the low lands on its borders.”)

Would you kindly answer me two or three questions if in your power? When species A becomes modified in another region into a well-marked form C, but is connected with it by one (or more) gradational forms B inhabiting an intermediate region; does this form B generally exist in equal numbers with A and C, OR INHABIT AN EQUALLY LARGE AREA? The probability is that you cannot answer this question, though one of your cases seems to bear on it...

You will, I think, be glad to hear that I now often hear of naturalists accepting my views more or less fully; but some are curiously cautious in running the risk of any small odium in expressing their belief.

LETTER 123. TO H.W. BATES. Down, April 4th [1861].

I have been unwell, so have delayed thanking you for your admirable letter. I hope you will not think me presumptuous in saying how much I have been struck with your varied knowledge, and with the decisive manner in which you bring it to bear on each point,--a rare and most high quality, as far as my experience goes. I earnestly hope you will find time to publish largely: before the Linnean Society you might bring boldly out your views on species. Have you ever thought of publis.h.i.+ng your travels, and working in them the less abstruse parts of your Natural History? I believe it would sell, and be a very valuable contribution to Natural History. You must also have seen a good deal of the natives. I know well it would be quite unreasonable to ask for any further information from you; but I will just mention that I am now, and shall be for a long time, writing on domestic varieties of all animals.

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