CHAPTER 1.IV.--EVOLUTION, 1864-1869.
LETTER 173. TO A.R. WALLACE. Down, January 1st, 1864.
I am still unable to write otherwise than by dictation. In a letter
received two or three weeks ago from Asa Gray he writes: "I read lately
with gusto Wallace's expose of the Dublin man on Bees' cells, etc."
(173/1. "Remarks on the Rev. S. Haughton's paper on the Bee's Cell and
on the Origin of Species" ("Ann. and Mag. Nat. Hist." XII., 1863, page
303). Prof. Haughton's paper was read before the Natural History Society
of Dublin, November 21st, 1862, and reprinted in the "Ann. and Mag.
Nat. Hist." XI., 1863, page 415. See Letters 73, 74, 75.) Now, though
I cannot read at present, I much want to know where this is published,
that I may procure a copy. Further on, Asa Gray says (after speaking of
Agassiz's paper on Glaciers in the "Atlantic Magazine" and his
recent book entitled "Method of Study"): "Pray set Wallace upon these
articles." So Asa Gray seems to think much of your powers of reviewing,
and I mention this as it assuredly is laudari a laudato. I hope you are
hard at work, and if you are inclined to tell me, I should much like to
know what you are doing. It will be many months, I fear, before I shall
do anything.
LETTER 174. TO J.L.A. DE QUATREFAGES. Down, March 27th [1864?].
I had heard that your work was to be translated, and I heard it with
pleasure; but I can take no share of credit, for I am not an active,
only an honorary member of the Society. Since writing I have finished
with extreme interest to the end your admirable work on metamorphosis.
(174/1. Probably "Metamorphoses of Man and the Lower Animals."
Translated by H. Lawson, 1864.) How well you are acquainted with the
works of English naturalists, and how generously you bestow honour on
them! Mr. Lubbock is my neighbour, and I have known him since he was a
little boy; he is in every way a thoroughly good man; as is my friend
Huxley. It gave me real pleasure to see you notice their works as you
have done.
LETTER 175. TO T.H. HUXLEY. Down, April 11th [1864].
I am very much obliged for your present of your "Comp. Anatomy." (175/1.
"Lectures on the Elements of Comparative Anatomy," 1864.) When strong
enough I am sure I shall read it with greatest interest. I could not
resist the last chapter, of which I have read a part, and have been much
interested about the "inspired idiot." (175/2. In reference to Oken
(op. cit., page 282) Huxley says: "I must confess I never read his works
without thinking of the epithet of 'inspired idiot' applied to our own
Goldsmith.") If Owen wrote the article "Oken" (175/3. The article on
Oken in the eighth edition of the "Encyclopaedia Britannica" is signed
"R.O.": Huxley wrote to Darwin (April 18th, 1864), "There is not the
smallest question that Owen wrote both the article 'Oken' and the
'Archetype' Book" (Huxley's "Life," I., page 250). Mr. Huxley's
statements amount to this: (1) Prof. Owen accuses Goethe of having in
1820 appropriated Oken's theory of the skull, and of having given an
apocryphal account of how the idea occurred to himself in 1790. (2) in
the same article, page 502, Owen stated it to be questionable whether
the discoverer of the true theory of the segmental constitution of
the skull (i.e. himself) was excited to his labours, or "in any way
influenced by the a priori guesses of Oken." On this Huxley writes, page
288: "But if he himself had not been in any way influenced by Oken, and
if the 'Programm' [of Oken] is a mere mass of 'a priori guesses,' how
comes it that only three years before Mr. Owen could write thus? 'Oken,
ce genie profond et penetrant, fut le premier qui entrevit la verite,
guide par l'heureuse idee de l'arrangement des os craniens en segments,
comme ceux du rachis, appeles vertebres...'" Later on Owen wrote:
"Cela servira pour exemple d'une examen scrupuleux des faits, d'une
appreciation philosophique de leurs relations et analogies, etc." (From
"Principes d'Osteologie comparee, ou Recherches sur l'Archetype," etc.,
pages 155, 1855). (3) Finally Huxley says, page 289, plainly: "The fact
is that, so far from not having been 'in any way influenced' by Oken,
Prof. Owen's own contributions to this question are the merest Okenism,
remanie.") and the French work on the Archetype (points you do not put
quite clearly), he never did a baser act...You are so good a Christian
that you will hardly understand how I chuckle over this bit of baseness.
I hope you keep well and hearty; I honour your wisdom at giving up at
present Society for Science. But, on the other hand, I feel it in myself
possible to get to care too much for Natural Science and too little for
other things. I am getting better, I almost dare to hope permanently;
for my sickness is decidedly less--for twenty-seven days consecutively I
was sick many times daily, and lately I was five days free. I long to do
a little work again. The magnificent (by far the most magnificent, and
too magnificent) compliment which you paid me at the end of your "Origin
of Species" (175/4. A title applied to the "Lectures to Working Men,"
that "green little book" referred to in Letter 156. Speaking of Mr.
Darwin's work he says (page 156): "I believe that if you strip it of its
theoretical part, it still remains one of the greatest encyclopaedias of
biological doctrine that any one man ever brought forth; and I believe
that, if you take it as the embodiment of an hypothesis, it is destined
to be the guide of biological and psychological speculation for the next
three or four generations.') I have met with reprinted from you two or
three times lately.
LETTER 175A. TO ERASMUS DARWIN. Down, June 30th, 1864.
(175A.1. The preceding letter contains a reference to the prolonged
period of ill-health which Darwin suffered in 1863 and 1864, and in this
connection the present letter is of interest.
The Copley Medal was given to him in 1864.)
I had not heard a word about the Copley Medal. Please give Falconer
my cordial thanks for his interest about me. I enclose the list of
everything published by me except a few unimportant papers. Ask Falconer
not to mention that I sent the list, as some one might say I had been
canvassing, which is an odious imputation. The origin of the Voyage in
the "Beagle" was that Fitz-Roy generously offered to give up half his
cabin to any one who would volunteer to go as naturalist. Beaufort wrote
to Cambridge, and I volunteered. Fitz-Roy never persuaded me to give
up the voyage on account of sickness, nor did I ever think of doing so,
though I suffered considerably; but I do not believe it was the cause of
my subsequent ill-health, which has lost me so many years, and therefore
I should not think the sea-sickness was worth notice. It would save you
trouble to forward this with my kindest remembrances to Falconer.
(176/1. The following letter was the beginning of a correspondence with
Mr. B.D. Walsh, whom C.V. Riley describes as "one of the ablest and most
thorough entomologists of our time.")
LETTER 176. B.D. WALSH TO CHARLES DARWIN. Rock Island, Illinois, U.S.,
April 29th, 1864.
(176/2. The words in square brackets are restorations of parts torn off
the original letter.)
More than thirty years ago I was introduced to you at your rooms in
Christ's College by A.W. Grisebach, and had the pleasure of seeing your
noble collection of British Coleoptera. Some years afterwards I became a
Fellow of Trinity, and finally gave up my Fellowship rather than go into
Orders, and came to this country. For the last five or six years I have
been paying considerable attention to the insect fauna of the U.S., some
of the fruits of which you will see in the enclosed pamphlets. Allow
me to take this opportunity of thanking you for the publication of your
"Origin of Species," which I read three years ago by the advice of
a botanical friend, though I had a strong prejudice against what I
supposed then to be your views. The first perusal staggered me, the
second convinced me, and the oftener I read it the more convinced I am
of the general soundness of your theory.
As you have called upon naturalists that believe in your views to give
public testimony of their convictions, I have directed your attention on
the outside of one or two of my pamphlets to the particular passages in
which [I] have done so. You will please accept these papers from me in
token of my respect and admiration.
As you may see from the latest of these papers, I [have] recently made
the remarkable discover that there [are the] so-called "three sexes" not
only in social insects but [also in the] strictly solitary genus Cynips.
When is your great work to make its appearance? [I should be] much
pleased to receive a few lines from you.
LETTER 177. TO B.D. WALSH. Down, October 21st [1864].
Ill-health has prevented me from sooner thanking you for your very kind
letter and several memoirs.
I have been very much pleased to see how boldly and clearly you speak
out on the modification of species. I thank you for giving me the pages
of reference; but they were superfluous, for I found so many original
and profound remarks that I have carefully looked through all the
papers. I hope that your discovery about the Cynips (177/1. "On
Dimorphism in the hymenopterous genus Cynips," "Proc. Entom. Soc.
Philadelphia," March, 1864. Mr. Walsh's view is that Cynips quercus
aciculata is a dimorphous form of Cynips q. spongifica, and occurs only
as a female. Cynips q. spongifica also produces spongifica females and
males from other galls at a different time of year.) will hold good, for
it is a remarkable one, and I for one have often marvelled what could
be the meaning of the case. I will lend your paper to my neighbour Mr.
Lubbock, who I know is much interested in the subject. Incidentally I
shall profit by your remarks on galls. If you have time I think a rather
hopeless experiment would be worth trying; anyhow, I should have tried
it had my health permitted. It is to insert a minute grain of some
organic substance, together with the poison from bees, sand-wasps,
ichneumons, adders, and even alkaloid poisons into the tissues of
fitting plants for the chance of monstrous growths being produced.
(177/2. See "Life and Letters," III., page 346, for an account of
experiments attempted in this direction by Mr. Darwin in 1880. On the
effects of injuring plant-tissues, see Massart, "La Cicatrisation, etc."
in Tome LVII. of the "Memoires Couronnes" of the Brussels Academy.)
My health has long been poor, and I have lately suffered from a long
illness which has interrupted all work, but I am now recommencing a