CHAPTER VI.

LETTERS TO DARWIN AND OTHERS.

1860-1868.

As before stated, Dr. Gray’s letters to Dr. Darwin previous to 1862 have

been destroyed, save the one dated January 23, 1860, which was published

in Darwin’s “Life and Letters,” and is here reproduced for the

convenience of the reader, as well as Dr. Gray’s letter of January 5,

1860, to Dr. Joseph D. Hooker, also published in Darwin’s “Life and

Letters.” The original letters to Darwin later than 1862 have been more

or less injured, apparently by the ravages of mice, so that in copying

them it has sometimes been necessary to supply missing words. Where

these are not obvious, the supposed words are enclosed in brackets.

The letters in this chapter also include the period of the civil war;

into which, as they show, Dr. Gray threw himself with all his

earnestness. He helped as far as he was able in every way. A company of

the men who were too old or otherwise incapacitated from going to the

front was enlisted in Cambridge to guard the State Arsenal there, and

also to be ready to be summoned in any emergency; and he joined the

ranks and was faithful in the drilling and every duty to which they were

called. It is hard to realize, in these days, how all the community

worked together in all possible ways; it was the business of life.

TO J. D. HOOKER.

CAMBRIDGE, January 5, 1860.

MY DEAR HOOKER,--Your last letter, which reached me just before

Christmas, has got mislaid during the upturnings in my study which take

place at that season, and has not yet been discovered. I should be very

sorry to lose it, for there were in it some botanical mems. which I had

not secured....

The principal part of your letter was high laudation of Darwin’s book.

Well, the book has reached me, and I finished its careful perusal four

days ago; and I freely say that your laudation is not out of place.

It is done in a masterly manner. It might well have taken twenty years

to produce it. It is crammed full of most interesting matter, thoroughly

digested, well expressed, close, cogent; and taken as a system it makes

out a better case than I had supposed possible....

I will write to Darwin when I get a chance. As I have promised, he and

you shall have fair play here.... I must myself write a review of

Darwin’s book for “Silliman’s Journal” (the more so that I suspect

Agassiz means to come out upon it) for the next (March) number, and I am

now setting about it when I ought to be every moment working the

Exploring Expedition Compositæ, which I know far more about. And really

it is no easy job, as you may well imagine.

I doubt if I shall please you altogether. I know I shall not please

Agassiz at all. I hear another reprint is in the press, and the book

will excite much attention here, and some controversy....

TO CHARLES DARWIN.

CAMBRIDGE, January 23, 1860.

MY DEAR DARWIN,--You have my hurried letter telling you of the arrival

of the remainder of the sheets of the reprint, and of the stir I had

made for a reprint in Boston. Well, all looked pretty well, when lo, we

found that a second New York publishing house had announced a reprint

also! I wrote then to both New York publishers, asking them to give way

to the author and his reprint of a revised edition. I got an answer from

Harpers that they withdraw; from the Appletons, that they had got the

book out (and the next day I saw a copy); but that, “if the work should

have any considerable sale, we certainly shall be disposed to pay the

author reasonably and liberally.”

The Appletons being thus out with their reprint, the Boston house

declined to go on. So I wrote to the Appletons, taking them at their

word, offering to aid their reprint, to give them the use of the

alterations in the London reprint, as soon as I find out what they are,

etc., etc. And I sent them the first leaf, and asked them to insert in

their future issue the additional matter from Butler,[45] which tells

just right. So there the matter stands. If you furnish any matter in

advance of the London third edition, I will make them pay for it.

I may get something for you. All got is clear gain; but it will not be

very much, I suppose.

Such little notices in the papers as have yet appeared are quite

handsome and considerable.

I hope next week to get printed sheets of my review from New Haven, and

send them to you, and will ask you to pass them on to Dr. Hooker.

To fulfill your request, I ought to tell you what I think the weakest,

and what the best, part of your book. But this is not easy, nor to be

done in a word or two. The best part, I think, is _the whole_, that is,

its plan and treatment, the vast amount of facts and acute inferences

handled as if you had a perfect mastery of them. I do not think twenty

years too much time to produce such a book in.

Style clear and good, but now and then wants revision for little matters

(p. 97, self-fertilizes itself, etc.).

Then your candor is worth everything to your cause. It is refreshing to

find a person with a new theory who frankly confesses that he finds

difficulties, insurmountable at least for the present. I know some

people who never have any difficulties to speak of.

The moment I understood your premises, I felt sure you had a real

foundation to hold on. Well, if one admits your premises, I do not see

how he is to stop short of your conclusions, as a probable hypothesis at

least.

It naturally happens that my review of your book does not exhibit

anything like the full force of the impression the book has made upon

me. Under the circumstances I suppose I do your theory more good here,

by bespeaking for it a fair and favorable consideration, and by standing

noncommitted as to its full conclusion, than I should if I announced

myself a convert; nor could I say the latter, with truth.

Well, what seems to me the weakest point in the book is the attempt to

account for the formation of organs, the making of eyes, etc., by

natural selection. Some of this reads quite Lamarckian.

The chapter on Hybridism is not a _weak_, but a _strong_ chapter. You

have done wonders there. But still you have not accounted, as you may be

held to account, for divergence up to a certain extent producing

increased fertility of the crosses, but carried one short, almost

imperceptible, step more, giving rise to sterility, or reversing the

tendency. Very likely you are on the right track; but you have something

to do yet in that department.

Enough for the present.

I am not insensible to your compliments, the very high compliment which

you pay me in valuing my opinion. You evidently think more of it than I

do, though from the way I write to you, and especially to Hooker, this

might not be inferred from the reading of my letters.

I am free to say that I never learnt so much from one book as I have

from yours. There remain a thousand things I long to say about it.

Ever yours,

ASA GRAY.

TO CHARLES L. BRACE.

1861 (?)

DEAR BRACE,--I should criticise various things in your last “Times”

article, if you were here to talk it over with me.

If you expected Huxley to do what you criticise him for not doing, you

would naturally be disappointed. His merit, and his way as a lecturer,

is to select some good topic or point of view and make a clear

exposition of it, the clearness of which very much depends upon his not

scattering himself over too much ground. He naturally kept himself to

matters he could handle well, and let alone those upon which, as we very

well know, he had nothing in particular to say.

1. “Merest fancies,” “baseless fabric of a dream,” etc.

Why, what made Owen an evolutionist as early as Darwin? And what has

made so many naturalists, Mivart, and lately Dana, for instance,

evolutionists, who yet think nothing of Natural Selection?

But to illustrate. You allow that the evolutionary pedigree of the horse

is made out. But what had “Natural Selection” to do with the making this

out?

It would have been all the very same, both the evidence and the ground

of the inference, if Natural Selection had never been propounded. There

is no evidence how the forms were selected, there is simply the _fact_

of the series of forms, which, with other like evidence, brings

conviction to most naturalists that one has somehow come from the other.

And this conviction is about as strong to those who do not believe

“Natural Selection” will explain it, as those who do.

2. Professor Guyot, you mean. Dana avowedly adopts from Guyot.

3. To those who talk or think of necessary evolution, or, like Spencer,

deduce it ex necessitate rei, this matter of immense time is very

pertinent. I don’t think Darwin is bothered by it much. On my way of

thinking, it is no bother at all, considering what a deal of time there

has been anyway.

4. Do you mean “hybrid forms”? I fail to see what hybrids, that is,

mules from the crossing of related species, has to do with it, one way

or the other. Nobody (of clear conceptions) supposes new species come

from the mixture of other species. That is a way to confuse or blend

species, not to originate them. But there is no “want of hybrids;”

there are plenty of them, and they have mixed some few species (dogs,

for instance); but they play no important part in the matters you are

considering.

“Want of connecting forms in living species,” that is to the purpose.

Well, as a systematic botanist, I wish there was a _want_. The

connecting forms are my _great trouble_ every day. You would save me an

awful deal of trouble, time, and constant uncertainty, if you would

cause them to be wanting!

5. So you will not accept the motto “ex uno disce omnes.”

If you admit the horse’s evolution as proved, does not that carry an

implication of evolution in other lines, of which similar, but fewer

steps are known? Or are all evolutions those of cavalry?

CAMBRIDGE, June 17, 1862.

DEAR BRACE,--Thanks for the “World.” Who wield its destinies?

It is, I suppose, your article on Darwin, a very good one, for its

purpose and space.

Before you too confidently reject the evidence for the existence of man

in the diluvial period, just turn over a very impartial and good article

by Pictet,--a good judge of such matters,--in the March number of the

“Bibliothèque Universelle de Genève,” “De la Question sur l’Homme

Fossile.”

I presume it is in the Astor Library. If it is not, you may tell Mr.

Cogswell there might as well not be any Astor Library.

Ever thine,

A. GRAY.

CAMBRIDGE, April 22, 1862 (?)

DEAR BRACE,--You are very welcome to such casual criticism as I can

offer on your two pages of manuscript.

The general fact of a segregated people (or individuals of an animal

species) becoming best adapted to the particular climate, etc., through

Natural Selection is clear enough, the best adapted alone surviving in

the long run, and the peculiarities transmitted by the close breeding.

But what your statements tend to make out is, not the tendency of a

human race to return to its original type, but only the tendency of the

causes which produced a certain effect once, to produce it again, the

circumstances continuing,--to produce it in the Fellahs as it produced

it in the remote ancestors of the Pharaohs.

That is all safe enough. But your case does not prove that unless you

make out that the Egyptian race was nearly destroyed by crossings.

I do not know, but I doubt if you can show that the crossings were ever

enough to modify the Egyptian people, at least the common people, who

make up the bulk. Slight infusions, you see, would be worked out. The

foreign though conquering race would be less prolific and less enduring

than the native, etc., etc. So is it not likely that in the Fellahs you

have the representatives of the old Egyptians continued, not reproduced,

as your remarks would partly lead one to suppose your meaning?

Besides, once having got a race you must not make too much of climate,

to the overlooking of the wonderful persistence of any variety when

close bred. See the Jews: the nose remains hooked, etc., under all

climates.

Again, in your last sentence. When you _unscientific people_ take up a

scientific principle you are apt to make too much of it, to push it to

conclusions beyond what is warranted by the facts. But, because a

particular race has persisted in Egypt, how do you know that it is the

only race capable of perpetuating itself?

If there had been a large infusion of different people in Egypt, and if

they had exterminated the old race, do you not suppose this would have

established itself, perpetuated itself, and that its particular

adaptations to the climate would have been different from that of the

present race?

If you cut off all future immigration into North America, would the

Indians resume possession of the country? or else our descendants become

a copper-colored race?

Enough for the present. When you have cracked these nuts, send me, if

you please, another sheet.

Ever yours cordially,

ASA GRAY.

CAMBRIDGE, July 6, 1863.

DEAR BRACE,--Yours of 20th ult. came just as J. was off for New Haven

and I getting ready to go to her aid.

We came back only on Thursday, or rather Friday morning. My hands so

full that I could not write to Darwin, to whom I owe a long letter, till

to-night. I will now inclose your note.

It would be very like a chemist to think that external influences will

explain everything. But I presume he believes that peculiarities are

heritable. If he does, then he thinks he can explain, or will be able to

explain, the origination of variations. I cannot, that is, to any

extent, and do not expect to. When he will show us how external

influences actually worked to change a peach into a nectarine, I will

consider his proposition.

If he means by “external influences” whatever has brought about the

change, very well. I, of course, allow that every variation has a cause,

a physical cause. But it seems to me you may as well say that conception

and the production of a normal offspring is the result of “external

influences” as the production of an abnormal (variant) offspring.

But there is no use writing at random.

You ask me whether I adhere to my notions before expressed, without at

all showing me how they have been impugned.

I should rather expect Guyot to indorse Beaumont; a theological bias

would act strongly.

But I rely most on Lartet, Coulon, and Pictet, for the age of deposit.

Yet it may still be an open question....

Darwin, on account of his health, has to live away from London, and is a

recluse. I give no letters to him, least of all to a lively inquisitive

Yankee like Beecher, who would give him a fit of dyspepsia at once, from

mere excitement.

I have the Imperial Academy of Sciences of St. Petersburg honorary

membership; quite a feather, as they are choice and few. Diploma just

come.

Ever yours,

A. GRAY.

TO R. W. CHURCH.

May 7, 1861.

It was very good of you to write to me (by your letter of 28th of March)

when I believe that a former letter of yours was still unacknowledged by

me. Your letters always give me much pleasure.

What you say of “Essays and Reviews” seems to me most sensible and well

considered; the best thing I have read about the book, viz., that, “with

many good and true things in it, it is a reckless book,” and that some

of the writers had not taken the trouble to clear up their own thoughts

and to form orderly and consistent notions before publishing upon such

delicate topics.

I have not yet read the book; have only looked it over, and read some of

the criticisms. When I have a few days’ leisure in the country, in July,

I mean to read it carefully. After the flurry is over, I hope the book

will receive the proper kind of handling in England, by the proper men.

I wish you would think it in your way to write an essay upon some of the

points at issue, upon which inconsiderate views are likely to be taken

upon either side.

I confess to a strong dislike of Baden Powell’s writings. He seems to

have had a coarse, materialistic, non-religious mind; at least, he is

not the sort of man I should select to illustrate the delicate relations

between religion and science.

I am gratified, also, by your apprehending the spirit and object of my

essay[46] on Darwin so much better than many who write to me about it.

All it pretends to is to warn the reckless and inconsiderate to state

the case as it is; to protest against the folly of those who would, it

would seem, go on to fire away the very ramparts of the citadel, in the

defense of needless outposts; and, as you justly remark, to clear the

way for a fair discussion of the new theory on its merits and evidence.

We must use the theory a while in botany and in zoölogy, and see how it

will work; in this way a few years will test it thoroughly. I incline

to think that its principles will be to a certain extent admitted in

science, but that, as Darwin conceives it, it will prove quite

insufficient.

As to our country, we have been, as a people, undergoing a steady

demoralization for the last fifteen or twenty years, the natural end of

which lately seemed to be that we should crumble into decay almost

without an effort at recovery. If it had been sought under legal forms

and in a less outrageous spirit, I think the North would have consented

to the peaceful separation of the cotton States, and we should have

prospered by the separation. But it has become clear that there would be

no living with such a people as our neighbors would be, so long as they

allow themselves (against the better judgment of the best) to be ruled

by the political demagogues who now hold sway over them. It is clear we

must fight, and we had better do it now, and fight for the integrity of

the country and the enforcement of the laws. So we are fairly and justly

in it, and we are going to conquer the South. They have appealed to

force. They must abide the consequences of the appeal, and, we trust,

God will help the right. So you may expect to hear of stirring times

here. Ever, with great regard,

Yours most cordially,

ASA GRAY.

TO GEORGE ENGELMANN.

January 25, 1861.

The Union is overthrown by a conspiracy which would have been kept

within bounds, and soon shut itself up, if the border slave States cared

enough for the Union to take hold, or even allow it to be arrested or

checked. But no, they must become insane, like the rest, and help it

along. Virginia will not take hold and second Kentucky and Tennessee,

fighting nobly by Johnson, Crittenden, etc., declare against treason

first, and then arrange terms, which are all ready, all they want, for

composing the difficulties.

But Cottondom will not have peace and union, and Virginia, etc., are

foolish enough to help their game. That the border Southern States will

be the principal sufferers will be only a righteous retribution for

their guilt.

If, in fact, we only belong to a partnership which any of the partners

can dissolve at will, then the Union is not worth having. We must do the

best we can without it, and if Missouri would prosper, she should stay

with us.

If peace is wanted, the reasonable proposition, “no more territory to be

acquired without a majority of two thirds of the States,” would give it.

With that you may do what you like, or rather what you can, in the

present Territories. No more of the continent is worth having, either

for North or South.

Posterity will judge rightly, and Toombs, Cobb, Floyd, etc., will go

down to their graves as base, dishonored traitors.

My fighting days are over, anyway. I have had the misfortune to lose the

end of my left thumb, by an accident, just at the base of the nail.

May 25, 1861.

I am very glad to hear from you. I believe I have a former letter from

you unanswered. Lately I mailed to you some botanical pamphlets, one

containing the Xantus California plants.[47] But in these times I had

not the heart to write you. You have seen your dream of peace policy

fall in pieces, and Douglas coming out for the war. You have also seen

enough to perceive that under the let-alone policy Missouri also would

have seceded, under the same discipline which has been applied

elsewhere. In which event, let alone, St. Louis would dwindle to a

country village.

No, the first and paramount duty of a country is to protect and preserve

itself against destruction. The Constitution and government must be

maintained, and treason put down if we are able to do it.

If it can’t be done, then, and then only, may we submit to

disintegration.

Stick firm to the Union, and Missouri will come out well. I am sorry for

the bloodshed at St. Louis. Your population is hard to manage. But

Harney, as you say, is doing well, and I expect to see your State soon a

loyal one. Even those with secession affinities must soon see their own

interests. It is impossible there should be peace,--peace is not worth

having till the rebellion, based on a plot formed years ago, is put

down.

If you think me belligerent, I am nothing to Agassiz. Of course we shall

all suffer severely. But better to suffer in devotion to the Union than

prosper in petty fragments.

Enough of this. May God preserve and keep you, and let us hear from you

when you can; for we take great interest in you, and know your position

is a trying one.

CAMBRIDGE, August 6, 1861.

MY DEAR ENGELMANN,--As soon as I got clear of college work, my wife and

I started off (on the 12th of July) to visit my mother and friends in

Oneida County, New York, where we rode and drove about in the fine air,

over a most beautiful country, and enjoyed ourselves to the full, to her

great advantage; also mine. Then we cut across the State to

Pennsylvania, visited the coal region of north Pennsylvania; traveled

very leisurely; passed through New York, seeing the Torreys three hours,

and so to Litchfield, Connecticut, where Mrs. G. is left, and I am at

home, to set to work again, having done nothing in botany except to

teach since last April.

Now I am going to set to work as soon as correspondence is cleared off.

I found here also a letter from Dr. Parry,[48] and have named the

specimens in both, sending the answer to you for forwarding, also Dr.

Parry’s letter to me.

He can’t miss it if he keeps at work between Denver and Salt Lake,

climbing to truly alpine regions as often as he can.

Dr. Hooker sent me last spring a fine cast of a bust of Robert Brown.

To-day I have also from him a splendid one of his father, Sir William.

Tell Fendler that Mr. Shaw should procure both if possible for the

Library of Hort. Bot., Missouri.

What next? A young gardener has found a locality of Calluna vulgaris,

covering almost an acre, within twenty-five miles of Boston; a case to

add to Scolopendrium, Marsilea, etc., but most of all, striking and

unexpected. It grows in low ground, and has every appearance of being

indigenous.

August 27.

I hope and trust that Frémont will be strong enough to keep the war out

of your neighborhood. The citizens of Missouri ought to volunteer in

such numbers as to keep the rebels out of the State and keep the State

true and firm in the Union. It is the cheapest and most honorable way,

and will save property, avoid distress, etc.

This rebellion is certainly going to be put down, no matter at what

cost, and property at St. Louis will be worth more than ever yet before

you and I reach three score and ten.

November 11.

I think very little of Unionists who have been “made Secessionists” by

anything. What matter whether you have one fifth, one tenth, or

four fifths Unionists, if they will not fight to put down

Secessionists,--they might as well be Secessionists out and out.

Maryland and Missouri will not and must not be allowed to secede or to

do seceders’ work, cost what it will. And it is a great blessing to them

that we restrain them. The Union must be preserved; suffering is a very

small matter in comparison--all must take their part, and the rebels

must suffer hard till they give up. We are only beginning to fight. If

Missouri wanted security she should have put down her secessionists

herself with the strong hand, at the beginning. So of Kentucky. But she

has been forced to find out and feel her duty and her honor, and to act.

God save the Union, and confusion to all traitors.

TO DANIEL CADY EATON.

CAMBRIDGE, October 4, 1861.

Your three parcels and letter of October first have duly come. I believe

I never answered your note of August 28.

I can’t abide writing letters nowadays. But I think often of you. You

are happy in being able to do something direct. I wish I could. Find me

a useful place in the army, and I will go at once.

My wife and I have scraped up $550, all we can scrape, and lent it to

the United States. I am amazed that people do not come forward with

their money--those that can’t go to fight. I wish I could do both....

I have to-day a letter from Wright, September 4. He is of late

botanizing with more spirit than formerly.

A sailing-vessel is up here for Santiago. I shall write by it, the

United States mail by steamer being so interrupted, and perhaps send

some publications, newspapers, etc. But I shall leave for you to send

the “Flora of the British West Indies,” as you suggest. I could not

spare my copy....

I hope this taking up of large transport vessels means something, and

something prompt and thorough.

Thus far one is sick and sad, so little is done.

I had some hopes that your good father would be put at the head of the

Commissary Department. I trust he will get promotion somewhat according

to his deserts anyhow. Oh for faithful and honest officers and

officials!...

TO GEORGE ENGELMANN.

CAMBRIDGE, January 15, 1862.

I do not like to write to you much about the war, and that is much

reason why I have not sooner replied to yours of December 9.

My brother-in-law and his cousin are both officers in Burnside’s

expedition, which we expect will do something.

Mrs. Gray and I send warmest New Year greetings to you and Mrs. E., and

hope you may feel all right and country safe in 1863.

February 20.

Bravo for Illinois, to which victory at Fort Donelson is due, and bravo

for Tennessee and Alabama full of Union men! Does not your old

Union blood rise? Pray, now drop all your let-treason-alone,

do-nothing-disorganizing notions, and go in for the country, the whole

country, reinstate it first, and then we will all go in and make it what

it should be. The ungenerous conduct of England shows what a condition

we should be in as a fraction, and she playing off one portion against

the other, and bullying both.

I pray Congress to put on taxes, five per cent direct on property and

income, and heavy indirect besides. What is property! I would fight till

every cent is gone, and would offer my own life freely; so I do not

value the lives or property of rebels above my own. God bless you.

May 22.

A most lovely spring here. We all flourish and prosper, and rejoice in

the strengthening of our national power, and advancing restoration of

the Union, with hopes of hanging leaders of the rebellion, exiling a

good many, and pardoning all the rank and file who will come back with a

good grace to their allegiance. If they will not, let them beware! Væ

victis to such.

The country is to be kept in the Union. If the people choose to stay,

let them, and peace be with them. If they wish to emigrate, very well.

The North, aided by immigrating Teutons, has great colonizing power, and

we can rapidly settle Virginia, Tennessee, Mississippi, etc.

There, this is enough for the present to rile you.

As to Euphorbias, the published names here must take precedence to

unpublished names of Shuttleworth, etc.

Ever your most peaceful friend,

ASA GRAY.

TO CHARLES DARWIN.

CAMBRIDGE, October 10, 1860.

Thanks for very interesting letter of September 10. I am much pressed

now, or would write a long gossiping letter. The bound copy of “Origin”

is just received from Murray. Many thanks....

I believe I have seen a pod or two of Horseradish; but they are rare.

Your germinations show curious resemblance of dimorphic-crosses with

hybrid-crosses, as shown by Naudin; very interesting and capital points

for you.

January (?), 1862.

I imagine it is now universally felt here that if we do not do it [i.

e., carry on the fighting] we shall have to eat much dirt; that the

establishment of a rival power on our long southern line of the free

States, to be played off against us, is not to be submitted to if it

can be prevented at any sacrifice. God help us, indeed, if our honorable

existence is to have no better safeguard than the generosity or sense of

justice of more powerful nations! As to slavery, the course of things is

getting to meet your views, as it is clear must be, if the South

continues obstinate. If they give up war they may save their institution

in their own States, to have the chance of abolishing it themselves in

the only safe and easy way, with time and the gradual competition of

white labor. But obstinate resistance will surely bring on wide-sweeping

manumission.

You see that we are not going to have war [with England] at present. And

it appears that the decision of our government will be as unitedly and

thoroughly sustained by the whole people as if it had been the other

way; contrary to Mr. Russell’s prediction, and to our dear friend Dr.

Boott’s, who writes about our “mob” in a way he would not if he were

here to see. Look at an English mob urging up their government so that

they felt obliged to back up their demands, with a menacing force on our

borders; and making such a peremptory demand as you justly say,

“entirely on Wilkes’ acting as judge;” a matter which our government

would as promptly concede as yours could ask.

Seemann[49] wrote me that the general belief at the clubs and in the

City was that our government wanted to get into war with England for an

excuse to give up the South. A pretty idea they must have of our wisdom

and discretion! Dear Boott is firmly convinced that we have all along

been trying to quarrel with England. The belief here is nearly

universal the other way, and those who like England best, and perhaps

the coolest and best-informed men, have been more and more dissatisfied

as time went on.

What has caused this lamentable state of things, this complete

misunderstanding? Plainly this: the secessionists in England have

adroitly managed the matter and led public opinion in various lines, but

all in one direction, inimical to us; and they did not think it too

great a stretch to make John Bull believe that we were insane enough to

want an English quarrel. In this they have been ably seconded by a few

papers here, mainly by those whose loyalty is deeply suspected, and

whose influence is as nothing; which are nearly as scurrilous as the

“Saturday Review,” with no redeeming ability, and you have the result.

Will the evidence that this mail carries satisfy the English that we

want to live in peace with them?

But as to good feeling, I am afraid it is too late to expect that.

We were hurt at first by your putting our rebels on the same footing as

a government with which yours was in most amicable relations,--and by

the general assumption at once that we were gone past redemption, by the

failure to see that the power had gone from the hands of those who were

always making trouble with your government in some petty way or other,

etc., till I think it is generally believed that the governing influence

in England desires to have us a weak and divided people, and would do a

good deal to secure it.

I am sorry to say that this is the general feeling; and this is now very

much intensified.

The feelings of many are very hostile, and they would like to be strong

that they might show it. Those of others, who have been exceedingly fond

of England, always defending her when possible, and these are mine, are,

that we must be strong to be secure and respected,--natural selection

quickly crushes out weak nations; that we have tried long enough to have

intimate relations between the governments, or the peoples in general.

Naturalists, etc., being enlightened people, can be as intimate as they

like; but nationally let each say, “God bless you, and let us see as

little of each other as possible,” each going our own way.

Well, enough of this.

Some of the representations of us in the English papers would be amusing

if they did not now do so great harm. One would think it was generally

thought that there was no law and order here, nor gentlemanly conduct,

nor propriety of deportment among the poorer and laboring people. I wish

you could come and see. As to such things, and as to intelligence,

education, etc., I have sometimes thought of the picture one could draw

from individual cases. Take one--very confidentially--for I would not

hurt a really good fellow by exposing his ignorance of what he might be

expected to know. Here we lately had a Cambridge graduate (F. L. S., and

godson of an English baronet) who in one conversation let us know most

frankly that he had no idea where Quito was, or that there were two

houses of Congress in the United States, and was puzzled to know whether

Boston, United States, time was faster or slower than that of

Greenwich!...

February 18, 1862.

Accept a hasty line at the present, when I am busy above measure.

Thanks for the Primula paper, which I have barely looked over.

I do hope that you and the other fourteen of your household are out of

bed and done with influenza.

As I have not given you up notwithstanding your very shocking principles

and prejudices against design in nature, so we shall try to abide your

longitudinarian defection. I suppose it is longitude, and I am sorry to

see that there is a wide and general desire in that meridian that we

(United States) should fall to pieces. But the more you want us to, the

more we won’t, and the more important it appears to us that we should be

a strong and unbroken power. God help us, if we do not keep strong

enough, at whatever cost now it may be, to resist the influence of a

country which looks upon the continuation of our steady policy to

protect and diversify our domestic industry as a wrong and sin against

it. No, no, we must have our own way. But the triumph of the Republicans

was the political destruction of the very people who were always making

trouble with England, and, if you would only let us and have some faith

in the North, we should have been permanently on the best of terms.

What you complain of in the Boston dinner[50] was indeed lamentable;

such men should not have talked bosh, even at a little private ovation,

and we have reason to know some of them were heartily ashamed of it as

soon as they saw it in print. It was immediately spoken of here, by

influential people, some of whom refused to attend the dinner, and in

at least one paper, in a tone like your own. It was really as bad as the

speeches of some members of Parliament, and worse because it was

foolish.

The fact is, a set of cunning fellows on both sides of the water (but

here utterly characterless) have contrived to make both English and

Yankees believe that each was bent upon quarreling with the other.

Your thinking of me “as an Englishman” would once have been a

compliment, and is what from my well-known feelings and expressions I

have passed for among my friends here. Had the North gone on giving in

to the South as for years past, I should have been one, at least in

residence, just as soon as I could have got out of the country. I thank

God, it has been otherwise, and that I have a country to be proud of,

and which I will gladly suffer for, if need be. With all its weakness

and follies (and I know them well) I go for my country, and to be

friendly with those we ought to be on good terms with. I am cured of

some illusions. We shall do very well, and the two countries will be on

the best of terms when we are strong; till then we must not expect it.

If it is the old question of struggle for life, good feeling has not

much to do with it: the weak must go to the wall, because it can’t help

it. “Blessed are the _strong_, for they shall inherit the earth.”

My wife, who is loath to strike you from her books, begs you to make

allowances for the people here, who were so very cocky at having caught

two such ineffable scamps as Mason and Slidell, whom we have reason to

hate with perfect hatred; that they thought of nothing else, and did not

mean to be saucy to England. But you have made us sore, there is no

denying it. We did not allow enough for longitude.

Her former message did not refer to Boott (though he is unfortunately

influenced by longitude; but is a Yankee born), nor to Hooker, who,

Gallio fashion, cares for none of these things; thinks us unwise for

fighting, I presume; but we perfectly agree to say nothing about such

matters. It is odd that you all fail to appreciate that it is simply a

struggle for existence on our part, and that men will persist in

thinking their existence of some consequence to themselves, though you

prove the contrary ever so plain; and will strike or grasp or kick,

right and left, in an undignified way sometimes; which the safe and

sound bystander, coolly looking on, may not appreciate, not sharing his

feelings, telling him the world will get on quite as well without him;

yet he somehow does not quite like it.

March 6.

I have your note of February 16, about Melastomaceæ. The test of a good

theory is said to be its power of predicting. If your speculations lead

you to predict the style curved to one side in Melastomaceæ, and the

prediction is verified, that will be a great matter in your favor. Why,

you are coming out so strong in final causes that they should make a D.

D. of you at Cambridge!

I shall be pleased if I can help you about Rhexia. R. Virginica grows

not far from here, and I will set to watching it next summer. But I fear

it may not help you, as it is stated in our “Flora of North America” to

have “anthers uniform.” I see, however, the phrase, “style somewhat

declined,” in the character; which must be looked to. The character was

drawn wholly from dried specimens. I have good details from fresh ones

drawn by Mr. Sprague, but cannot just now lay hands on them.

Freely point out anything else you want looked at. I have now a very

zealous pupil, who will be glad to be intrusted with looking up plants

and observing.

Ever yours, cordially,

ASA GRAY.

There is some jolly science in the “Saturday Review,” now and then; as

in December 28, p. 665, where we are informed that icebergs “are formed

by the splashing of the waves on the coast of Labrador.”

Mill being “the greatest logician in England,” I send you an American

reprint of a specimen of his logic, which I know you will like.

We are very sad here at the death of the president of our

university,[51] who had also many warm friends in England.

March 31.

Yours of the 15th came this evening. To-morrow I am busy all day in

college (where I began my course this year with lectures on

Fertilization, developing your views on orchid-insect fertilization,

dimorphism, etc., etc., to an interested class!), so I must drop a line

for you into a letter for Boott, for Wednesday’s post.

A friend has just handed me Morell’s new book, which, looking at

psychology from the physiological side, I see brings up several notions

which have been turning over in my mind for some years. He is coming out

a good Darwinian, I see, and is quite of my way of thinking about

design. You see I am determined to baptize [“The Origin of Species”],

nolens volens, which will be its salvation. But if you won’t have it

done, it will be damned, I fear....

Things move on here, on the whole, very well.

Yes, I will promise not to hate you; quite the contrary!

Our sensitiveness as to England was the natural result of the strong

filial feeling on our part. It was very undignified, I dare say. But I

think we are getting bravely over it, and getting really not to care

what the Old Country may think or say, so it lets us alone.

As to Rebeldom, there is now hardly any State that we have not got some

foothold in.

I do not do so much scientific work as before the war, but still I keep

pottering away. From now till July, I can expect to do little besides my

college duties. Ever, dear Darwin, your cordial friend and true Yankee,

A. GRAY.

May 18.

Yesterday came by post the sheets B-I of your Orchid book.

This evening (Sunday) I have opened the parcel and read introduction and