Chapter 6

III.--Correspondence on Biology, Geographical Distribution, etc.

[1894--1913]

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HERBERT SPENCER TO A.R. WALLACE

_Queen's Hotel, Cliftonville, Margate. August 10, 1894._

Dear Mr. Wallace,--Though we differ on some points we agree on many, and one of the points on which we doubtless agree is the absurdity of Lord Salisbury's representation of the process of Natural Selection based upon the improbability of two varying individuals meeting. His nonsensical representation of the theory ought to be exposed, for it will mislead very many people. I see it is adopted by the _Pall Mall_. I have been myself strongly prompted to take the matter up, but it is evidently your business to do that. Pray write a letter to the _Times_ explaining that selection or survival of the fittest does not necessarily take place in the way he describes. You might set out by remarking that whereas he begins by comparing himself to a volunteer colonel reviewing a regiment of regulars, he very quickly changes his attitude and becomes a colonel of regulars reviewing volunteers and making fun of their bunglings. He deserves a-severe castigation. There are other points on which his views should be rectified, but this is the essential point.

It behoves you of all men to take up the gauntlet he has thrown down.--Very truly yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

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HERBERT SPENCER TO A.R. WALLACE

_Queen's Hotel, Cliftonville, Margate, Aug. 19, 1894._

Dear Mr. Wallace,--I cannot at all agree with you respecting the relative importance of the work you are doing and that which I wanted you to do. Various articles in the papers show that Lord Salisbury's argument is received with triumph, and, unless it is disposed of, it will lead to a public reaction against the doctrine of evolution at large, a far more serious evil than any error which you propose to rectify among biologists. Everybody will look to you for a reply, and if you make no reply it will be understood that Lord Salisbury's objection is valid. As to the non-publication of your letter in the _Times_, that is absurd, considering that your name and that of Darwin are constantly coupled together.--Truly yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

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TO PROF. POULTON

_Parkstone, Dorset. September 8, 1894._

My dear Poulton,--I was glad to see your exposure of another American Neo-Lamarckian in _Nature_.[24] It is astonishing how utterly illogical they all are! I was much pleased with your point of the adaptations supposed to be produced by the inorganic environment when they are related to the organic. It is I think new and very forcible. For nearly a month I have been wading through Bateson's book,[25] and writing a criticism of it, and of Galton, who backs him up with his idea of "organic stability." ... Neither he nor Galton appears to have any adequate conception of what Natural Selection is, or how impossible it is to escape from it. They seem to think that, given a stable variation, Natural Selection must hide its diminished head!

Bateson's preface, concluding reflections, etc., are often quite amusing.... He is so cocksure he has made a great discovery--which is the most palpable of mare's nests.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

P.S.--I allude of course to his grand argument--"environment _continuous_--species _discontinuous_--therefore _variations_ which produce species must be also _discontinuous_"! (Bateson--Q.E.D.).

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TO PROF. POULTON

_Parkstone, Dorset. February 19, 1895._

My dear Poulton,--I have read your paper on "Theories of Evolution"[26] with great pleasure. It is very clear and very forcible, and I should think must have opened the eyes of some of your hearers. Your cases against Lamarckism were very strong, and I think quite conclusive. There is one, however, which seems to me weak--that about the claws of lobsters and the tails of lizards moving and acting when detached from the body. It may be argued, fairly, that this is only an incidental result of the extreme muscular irritability and contractibility of the organs, which might have been caused on Lamarckian as well as on the Darwinian hypothesis. The running of a fowl after its head is chopped off is an example of the same kind of thing, and this is certainly not useful. The detachment itself of claw and tail is no doubt useful and adaptive.

When discussing the objection as to failures not being found fossil, there are two additional arguments to those you adduce: (1) Every failure has been, first, a success, or it could not have come into existence (as a species); and (2) the hosts of huge and very specialised animals everywhere recently extinct are clearly failures. They were successes as long as the struggle was with animal competitors only, physical conditions being highly favourable. But, when physical conditions became adverse, as by drought, cold, etc., they failed and became extinct. The entrance of new enemies from another area might equally render them failures. As to your question about myself and Darwin, I had met him once only for a few minutes at the British Museum before I went to the East.... --Yours very faithfully,

A.R. WALLACE.

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TO MR. CLEMENT REID

_Parkstone, Dorset. November 18, 1894._

My dear Clement Reid,-- ... The great, the grand, and long-expected, the prophesied discovery has at last been made--Miocene or Old Pliocene Man in India!!! Good worked flints found _in situ_ by the palæontologist to the Geological Survey of India! It is in a ferruginous conglomerate lying beneath 4,000 feet of Pliocene strata and containing hippotherium, etc. But perhaps you have seen the article in _Natural Science_ describing it, by Rupert Jones, who, very properly, accepts it! Of course we want the bones, but we have got the flints, and they may follow. Hurrah for the missing link! Excuse more.--Yours very faithfully,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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The next letter relates to the rising school of biologists who, in opposition to Darwin's views, held that species might arise by what was at the time termed "discontinuous variation."

TO PROF. MELDOLA

_February 4, 1895._

My dear Professor Meldola,--I hope to have copies of my "Evolution" article in a few days, and will send you a couple. The article was in print last September, but, being long, was crowded out month after month, and only now got in by being cut in two. I think I have demolished "discontinuous variation" as having any but the most subordinate part in evolution of species.

Congratulations on Presidency of the Entomological Society.

A.R. WALLACE.

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TO PROF. POULTON

_Parkstone, Dorset. March 15, 1895._

My dear Poulton,--I have now nearly finished reading Romanes, but do not find it very convincing. There is a large amount of special pleading. On two points only I feel myself hit. My doubt that Darwin really meant that _all_ the individuals of a species could be similarly modified without selection is evidently wrong, as he adduces other quotations which I had overlooked. The other point is, that my suggested explanation of sexual ornaments gives away my case as to the utility of all specific characters. It certainly does as it stands, but I now believe, and should have added, that all these ornaments, where they differ from species to species, are also recognition characters, and as such were rendered stable by Natural Selection from their first appearance.

I rather doubt the view you state, and which Gulick and Romanes make much of, that a portion of a species, separated from the main body, will have a different average of characters, unless they are a local race which has already been somewhat selected. The large amount of variation, and the regularity of the curve of variation, whenever about 50 or 100 individuals are measured in the same locality, shows that the bulk of a species are similar in amount of variation everywhere. But when a portion of a species begins to be modified in adaptation to new conditions, distinction of some kind is essential, and therefore any slight difference would be increased by selection. I see no reason to believe that species (usually) have been isolated first and modified afterwards, but rather that new species usually arise from species which have a wide range, and in different areas need somewhat different characters and habits. Then _distinctness_ arises both by adaptation and by development of recognition marks to minimise intercrossing.

I wonder Darwin did not see that if the unknown "constant causes" he supposes can modify all the individuals of a species, either indifferently, usefully, or hurtfully, and that these characters so produced are, as Romanes says, very, very numerous in all species, and are sometimes the only specific characters, then the Neo-Lamarckians are quite right in putting Natural Selection as a very secondary and subordinate influence, since all it has to do is to weed out the hurtful variations.

Of course, if a species with warning colours were, in part, completely isolated, and its colours or markings were accidentally different from the parent form, whatever set of markings and colours it had would be, I consider, rendered stable for recognition, and also for protection, since if it varied too much the young birds and other enemies would take a heavier toll in learning it was uneatable. It might then be said that the character by which this species differs from the parent species is a useless character. But surely this is not what is usually meant by a "useless character." This is highly useful in itself, though the difference from the other species is not useful. If they were in contact it would be useful, as a distinction preventing intercrossing, and so long as they are not brought together we cannot really tell if it is a species at all, since it might breed freely with the parent form and thus return back to one type. The "useless characters" I have always had in mind when arguing this question are those which are or are supposed to be absolutely useless, not merely relatively as regards the difference from an allied species. I think this is an important distinction.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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HERBERT SPENCER TO A.R. WALLACE

_64 Avenue Road, Regent's Park, London, N.W. September 28, 1895_

Dear Mr. Wallace,--As I cannot get you to deal with Lord Salisbury I have decided to do it myself, having been finally exasperated into doing it by this honour paid to his address in France--the presentation of a translation to the French Academy. The impression produced upon some millions of people in England cannot be allowed to be thus further confirmed without protest.

One of the points which I propose to take up is the absurd conception Lord Salisbury sets forth of the process of Natural Selection. When you wrote you said you had dealt with it yourself in your volume on Darwinism. I have no doubt that it is also in some measure dealt with by Darwin himself, by implication or incidentally. You of course know Darwin by heart, and perhaps you would be kind enough to save me the trouble of searching by indicating the relevant passages both in his books and in your own. My reading power is very small, and it tries me to find the parts I want by much reading.--Truly yours,

HERBERT SPENCER.

* * * * *

To the following letter from Mr. Gladstone, Wallace attached this pencil note: "In 1881 I put forth the first idea of mouth-gesture as a factor in the origin of language, in a review of E.B. Tylor's 'Anthropology,' and in 1895 I extended it into an article in the _Fortnightly Review_, and reprinted it with a few further corrections in my 'Studies,' under the title 'The Expressiveness of Speech or Mouth-Gesture as a Factor in the Origin of Language.' In it I have developed a completely new principle in the theory of the origin of language by showing that every motion of the jaws, lips and tongue, together with inward or outward breathing, and especially the mute or liquid consonants ending words which serve to indicate abrupt or continuous motion, have corresponding meanings in so many cases as to show a fundamental connection. I thus enormously extended the principle of onomatopoeia in the origin of vocal language. As I have been unable to find any reference to this important factor in the origin of language, and as no competent writer has pointed out any fallacy in it, I think I am justified in supposing it to be new and important. Mr. Gladstone informed me that there were many thousands of illustrations of my ideas in Homer."--A.R.W.

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W.E. GLADSTONE TO A.R. WALLACE

_Hawarden Castle, Chester. October 18, 1895._

Dear Sir,--Your kindness in sending me your most interesting article draws on you the inconvenience of an acknowledgment.

My pursuits in connection with Homer, especially, have made me a confident advocate of the doctrine that there is, within limits, a connection in language between sound and sense.

I would consent to take the issue simply on English words beginning with _st_. You go upon a kindred class in _sn_. I do not remember a perfectly _innocent_ word, a word habitually used _in bonam partem_, and beginning with _sn_, except the word "snow," and "snow," as I gather from _Schnee_, is one of the worn-down words.

May I beg to illustrate you once more on the ending in _p_. I take our old schoolboy combinations: hop, skip and jump. Each motion an ending motion; and to each word closed with _p_ compare the words _run, rennen, courir, currere._

But I have now a new title to speak. It is deafness; and I know from deafness that I run a worse chance with a man whose mouth is covered with beard and moustache.

A young relation of mine, slightly deaf, was sorely put to it in an University examination because one of his examiners was _secretal_ in this way.

I will not trouble you further except to express, with misgiving, a doubt on a single point, the final _f_.

In driving with Lord Granville, who was deaf but not very deaf, I had occasion to mention to him the Duke of _Fife_, I used every effort, but in no way could I contrive to make him hear the word.

I break my word to add one other particular. Out of 27,000 odd lines in Homer, every one of them expressed, in a sense, heavy weight or force; the blows of heavy-armed men on the breastplates of foes ... [illegible] and the like.--With many thanks, I remain yours very faithfully,

W.E. GLADSTONE.

P.S.--I should say that the efficacy of lip-expression, undeniably, is most subtle, and defies definite description.

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TO DR. ARCHDALL REID

_Parkstone, Dorset. April 19, 1896._

Dear Sir,--I am sorry I had not space to refer more fully to your interesting work.[27] The most important point on which I think your views require emendation is on _instinct_. I see you quote Spalding's experiments, but these have been quite superseded and shown to be seriously incorrect by Prof. Lloyd Morgan. A paper by him in the _Fortnightly Review_ of August, 1893, gives an account of his experiments, and he read a paper on the same subject at the British Association last year. He is now preparing a volume on the subject which will contain the most valuable series of observations yet made on this question. Another point of some importance where I cannot agree with you is your treating dipsomania as a disease, only to be eliminated by drunkenness and its effects. It appears to me to be only a vicious habit or indulgence which would cease to exist in a state of society in which the habit were almost universally reprobated, and the means for its indulgence almost absent. But this is a matter of comparatively small importance.--Believe me yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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TO DR. ARCHDALL REID

_Parkstone. April 28, 1896._

Dear Sir,--"We can but reason from the facts we know." We know a good deal of the senses of the higher animals, very little of those of insects. If we find--as I think we do--that all cases of supposed "instinctive knowledge" in the former turn out to be merely intuitive reactions to various kinds of stimulus, combined with very rapidly acquired experience, we shall be justified in thinking that the actions of the latter will some day be similarly explained. When Lloyd Morgan's book is published we shall have much information on this question. (_See_ "Natural Selection and Tropical Nature," pp. 91-7.)--Yours truly, ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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TO PROF. MELDOLA

_Parkstone, Dorset. October 12, 1896._

My dear Meldola,--I got Weismann's "Germinal Selection" two or three months back and read it very carefully, and on the whole I admire it very much, and think it does complete the work of ordinary variation and selection. Of course it is a pure hypothesis, and can never perhaps be directly proved, but it seems to me a reasonable one, and it enables us to understand two groups of facts which I have never been able to work out satisfactorily by the old method. These two facts are: (1) the total, or almost total, disappearance of many useless organs, and (2) the continuous development of secondary sexual characters beyond any conceivable utility, and, apparently, till checked by inutility. It explains both these. Disuse alone, as I and many others have always argued, cannot do the first, but can only cause _regression to the mean_, with perhaps some further regression from economy of material.

As to the second, I have always felt the difficulty of accounting for the enormous development of the peacock's train, the bird of paradise plumes, the long wattle of the bell bird, the enormous tail-feathers of the Guatemalan trogon, of some humming-birds, etc. etc. etc. The beginnings of all these I can explain as recognition marks, and this explains also their distinctive character in allied species, but it does not explain their growing on and on far beyond what is needful for recognition, and apparently till limited by absolute hurtfulness. It is a relief to me to have "germinal selection" to explain this.

I do not, however, think it at all necessary to explain adaptations, however complex. Variation is so general and so large, in dominant species, and selection is so tremendously powerful, that I believe all needful adaptation may be produced without it. But, if it exists, it would undoubtedly hasten the process of such adaptation and would therefore enable new places in the economy of nature to be more rapidly filled up.

I was thinking of writing a popular exposition of the new theory for _Nature_, but have not yet found time or inclination for it. I began reading "Germinal Selection" with a prejudice against it. That prejudice continued through the first half, but when I came to the idea itself, and after some trouble grasped the meaning and bearing of it, I saw the work it would do and was a convert at once. It really has no relation to Lamarckism, and leaves the non-heredity of acquired characters exactly where it was.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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The next letter relates to the great controversy then being carried on with respect to Weismann's doctrine of the non-inheritance of "acquired" characters, which doctrine implied complete rejection of the last trace of Lamarckism from Darwinian evolution. Wallace ultimately accepted the Weismannian teaching. Darwin had no opportunity during his lifetime of considering this question, which was raised later in an acute form by Weismann.

TO PROF. MELDOLA

_Parkstane, Dorset. January 6, 1897._

My dear Meldola,--The passage to which you refer in the "Origin" (top of p. 6) shows Darwin's firm belief in the "heredity of acquired variations," and also in the importance of definite variations, that is, "sports," though elsewhere he almost gives these up in favour of indefinite variations; and this last is now the view of all Darwinians, and even of many Lamarckians. I therefore always now assume this as admitted. Weismann's view as to "possible variations" and "impossible variations" on p. 1 of "Germinal Selection" is misleading, because it can only refer to "sports" or to "cumulative results," not to "individual variations" such as are the material Natural Selection acts on. Variation, as I understand it, can only be a slight modification in the offspring of that which exists in the parent. The question whether pigs could possibly develop wings is absurd, and altogether beside the question, which is, solely, so far as direct evidence goes, as to the means by which the change from one species to another closely allied species has been brought about. Those who want to begin by discussing the causes of change from a dog to a seal, or from a cow to a whale, are not worth arguing with, as they evidently do not comprehend the A, B, C of the theory.

Darwin's ineradicable acceptance of the theory of heredity of the effects of climate, use and disuse, food, etc., on the individual led to much obscurity and fallacy in his arguments, here and there.--Yours very sincerely,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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TO PROF. POULTON _Parkstone, Dorset. February 14, 1897._

My dear Poulton,--Thanks for copy of your British Association Address,[28] which I did not read in _Nature_, being very busy just then. I have now read it with much pleasure, and think it a very useful and excellent discussion that was much needed. There is, however, one important error, I think, which vitiates a vital part of the argument, and which renders it possible so to reduce the time indicated by geology as to render the accordance of Geology and Physics more easy to effect. The error I allude to was made by Sir A. Geikie in his Presidential Address[29] which you quote. Immediately it appeared I wrote to him pointing it out, but he merely acknowledged my letter, saying he would consider it. To me it seems a most palpable and extraordinary blunder. The error consists in taking the rate of deposition as the same as the rate of denudation, whereas it is about twenty times as great, perhaps much more--because the area of deposition is at least twenty times less than that of denudation. In order to equal the area of denudation, it would require that _every_ bed of _every_ formation should have once extended over the _whole area_ of all the land of the globe! The deposition in narrow belts along coasts of all the matter brought down by rivers, as proved by the _Challenger_, leads to the same result. In my "Island Life," 2nd Edit., pp. 221-225, I have discussed this whole matter, and on reading it again I can find no fallacy in it. I have, however, I believe, overestimated the time required for deposition, which I believe would be more nearly one-fortieth than one-twentieth that of mean denudation; because there is, I believe, also a great overestimate of the maximum of deposition, because it is partly made up of beds which may have been deposited simultaneously. Also the maximum thickness is probably double the mean thickness.

The mean rate of denudation, both for European rivers and for all the rivers that have been measured, is a foot in three million years, which is the figure that should be taken in calculations.--Believe me yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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TO PROF. MELDOLA

_Parkstone, Dorset. April 27, 1897._

My dear Meldola,-- ... I thought Romanes' article in reply to Spencer was very well written and wonderfully clear for him, and I agree with most of it, except his high estimate of Spencer's co-adaptation argument. It is quite true that Spencer's biology rests entirely on Lamarckism, so far as heredity of acquired characters goes. I have been reading Weismann's last book, "The Germ Plasm." It is a wonderful attempt to solve the most complex of all problems, and is almost unreadable without some practical acquaintance with germs and their development.--Believe me yours very faithfully,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Parkstone, Dorset. June 13, 1897._

My dear Poulton,-- ... The rate of deposition might be modified in an archipelago, but would not necessarily be less than now, on the _average_. On the ocean side it might be slow, but wherever there were comparatively narrow straits between the islands it might be even faster than now, because the area of deposition would be strictly limited. In the seas between Java and Borneo and between Borneo and Celebes the deposition _may be_ above the average. Again, during the development of continents there were evidently extensive mountain ridges and masses with landlocked seas, or inland lakes, and in all these deposition would be rapid. Anyhow, the fact remains that there is no necessary equality between rates of denudation and deposition (in thickness) as Geikie has _assumed_.

I was delighted with your account of Prichard's wonderful anticipation of Galton and Weismann! It is so perfect and complete.... It is most remarkable that such a complete statement of the theory and such a thorough appreciation of its effects and bearing should have been so long overlooked. I read Prichard when I was very young, and have never seen the book since. His facts and arguments are really useful ones, and I should think Weismann must be delighted to have such a supporter come from the grave. His view as to the supposed transmission of disease is quite that of Archdall Reid's recent book. He was equally clear as to Selection, and had he been a _zoologist_ and _traveller_ he might have anticipated the work of both Darwin and Weismann!

To bring out such a book as his "Researches" when only twenty-seven, and a practising physician, shows what a remarkable man he was.--Believe me yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. MELDOLA

_Parkstone, Dorset. July 8, 1897._

My dear Meldola,-- ... I am now reading a wonderfully interesting book--O. Fisher's "Physics of the Earth's Crust." It is really a grand book, and, though full of unintelligible mathematics, is so clearly explained and so full of good reasoning on all the aspects of this most difficult question that it is a pleasure to read it. It was especially a pleasure to me because I had just been writing an article on the Permanence of the Oceanic Basins, at the request of the Editor of _Natural Science_, who told me I was not orthodox on the point. But I find that Fisher supports the same view with very great force, and it strikes me that if weight of argument and number of capable supporters create orthodoxy in science, it is the other side who are not orthodox. I have some fresh arguments, and I was delighted to be able to quote Fisher. It seems almost demonstrated now that Sir W. Thomson was wrong, and that the earth _has_ a molten interior and a very thin crust, and in no other way can the phenomena of geology be explained....--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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TO SIR OLIVER LODGE

_Parkstone, Dorset. March 8, 1898._

My dear Sir,--My own opinion has long been--and I have many times given reasons for it--that there is always an ample amount of variation in all directions to allow any useful modification to be produced, very rapidly, as compared with the rate of those secular changes (climate and geography) which necessitate adaptation; hence no guidance of variation in certain lines is necessary. For proof of this I would ask you to look at the diagrams in Chapter III. of my "Darwinism," reading the explanation in the text. The proof of such constant indefinite variability has been much increased of late years, and if you consider that instead of tens or hundreds of individuals, Nature has as many thousands or millions to be selected from, every year or two, it will be clear that the materials for adaptation are ample.

Again, I believe that the time, even as limited by Lord Kelvin's calculations, is ample, for reasons given in Chapter X., "On the Earth's Age," in my "Island Life," and summed up on p. 236. I therefore consider the difficulty set forth on p. 2 of the leaflet you send is not a real one. To my mind, the development of plants and animals from low forms of each is fully explained by the variability proved to exist, with the actual rapid multiplication and Natural Selection. For this no other intellectual agency is required. The problem is to account for the infinitely complex constitution of the material world and its forces which rendered living organisms possible; then, the introduction of consciousness or sensation, which alone rendered the animal world possible; lastly, the presence in man of capacities and moral ideas and aspirations which could not conceivably be produced by variation and Natural Selection. This is stated at p. 473-8 of my "Darwinism," and is also referred to in the article I enclose (at p. 443) and which you need not return.

The subject is so large and complex that it is not to be wondered so many people still maintain the insufficiency of Natural Selection, without having really mastered the facts. I could not, therefore, answer your question without going into some detail and giving references.... --Believe me yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO MR. H.N. RIDLEY

_Parkstone, Dorset. October 3, 1898._

My dear Mr. Ridley,-- ... We are much interested now about De Rougemont, and I dare say you have seen his story in the _Wide World Magazine_, while in the _Daily Chronicle_ there have been letters, interviews and discussions without end. A few people, who think they know everything, treat him as an impostor; but unfortunately they themselves contradict each other, and so far are proved to be wrong more often than De Rougemont. I firmly believe that his story is substantially true--making allowance for his being a foreigner who learnt one system of measures, then lived thirty years among savages, and afterwards had to reproduce all his knowledge in English and Australian idioms. As an intelligent writer in the _Saturday Review_ says, putting aside the sensational illustrations there is absolutely nothing in his story but what is quite _possible_ and even _probable_. He must have reached Singapore the year after I returned home, and I dare say there are people there who remember Jensen, the owner of the schooner _Veilland_, with whom he sailed on his disastrous pearl-fishing expedition. Jensen is said now to be in British New Guinea, and has often spoken of his lost cargo of pearls. ---- and ----, of the Royal Geographical Society, state that they are convinced of the substantial truth of the main outlines of his story, and after three interviews and innumerable questions are satisfied of his _bona fides_--and so am I.--With best wishes, believe me to be yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

MR. SAMUEL WADDINGTON TO A.R. WALLACE

_7 Whitehall Gardens, London, S.W. February 19, 1901._

Dear Sir,--I trust you will forgive a stranger troubling you with a letter, but a friend has asked me whether, as a matter of fact, Darwin held that _all_ living creatures descended from one and the same ancestor, and that the pedigree of a humming-bird and that of a hippopotamus would meet if traced far enough back. Can you tell me whether Darwin did teach this?

I should have thought that as life was developed once, it probably could and would be developed many times in different places, as month after month, and year after year went by; and that, from the very first, it probably took many different forms and characters, in the same way as crystals take different forms and shapes, even when composed of the same substance. From these many developments of "life" would descend as many separate lines of evolution, one ending in the humming-bird, another in the hippopotamus, a third in the kangaroo, etc., and their pedigrees (however far back they might be traced) would not join until they reached some primitive form of protoplasm,--Yours faithfully,

SAMUEL WADDINGTON.

* * * * *

TO MR. SAMUEL WADDINGTON

_Parkstone, Dorset. February 23, 1901._

Dear Sir,--Darwin believed that all living things originated from "a few forms or from one"--as stated in the last sentence of his "Origin of Species." But privately I am sure he believed in the _one_ origin. Of course there is a possibility that there were several distinct origins from inorganic matter, but that is very improbable, because in that case we should expect to find some difference in the earliest forms of the germs of life. But there is no such difference, the primitive germ-cells of man, fish or oyster being almost indistinguishable, formed of identical matter and going through identical primitive changes.

As to the humming-bird and hippopotamus, there is no doubt whatever of a common origin--if evolution is accepted at all; since both are vertebrates--a very high type of organism whose ancestral forms can be traced back to a simple type much earlier than the common origin of mammals, birds and reptiles.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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TO SIR FRANCIS DARWIN

_Parkstone, Dorset. July 3, 1901._

Dear Mr. Darwin,--Thanks for the letter returned. I _do_ hold the opinion expressed in the last sentence of the article you refer to, and have reprinted it in my volume of Studies, etc. But the stress must be laid on the word _proof_. I intended it to enforce the somewhat similar opinion of your father, in the "Origin" (p. 424, 6th Edit.), where he says, "Analogy may be a deceitful guide." But I really do not go so far as he did. For he maintained that there was not any proof that the several great classes or kingdoms were descended from common ancestors.

I maintain, on the contrary, that all without exception are now proved to have originated by "descent with modification," but that there is no proof, and no necessity, that the very same causes which have been sufficient to produce all the species of a genus or Order were those which initiated and developed the greater differences. At the same time I do _not_ say they were not sufficient. I merely urge that there is a difference between proof and probability.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

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TO PROF. POULTON

_Broadstone, Wimborne. August 5, 1904._

My dear Poulton,-- ... What a miserable abortion of a theory is "Mutation," which the Americans now seem to be taking up in place of Lamarckism, "superseded." Anything rather than Darwinism! I am glad Dr. F.A. Dixey shows it up so well in this week's _Nature_,[30] but too mildly!--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Broadstone, Wimborne. April 3, 1905._

My dear Poulton,--Many thanks for copy of your Address,[31] which I have read with great pleasure and will forward to Birch next mail. You have, I think, produced a splendid and unanswerable set of facts proving the non-heredity of acquired characters. I was particularly pleased with the portion on "instincts," in which the argument is especially clear and strong. I am afraid, however, the whole subject is above and beyond the average "entomologist" or insect collector, but it will be of great value to all students of evolution. It is curious how few even of the more acute minds take the trouble to reason out carefully the teaching of certain facts--as in the case of Romanes and the "variable protection," and as I showed also in the case of Mivart (and also Romanes and Gulick) declaring that isolation alone, without Natural Selection, could produce perfect and well-defined species (see _Nature_, Jan. 12, 1899).... --Yours faithfully,

A.R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO SIR FRANCIS DARWIN

_Broadstone, Wimborne. October 29, 1905._

Dear Mr. Darwin,--I return you the two articles on "Mutation" with many thanks. As they are both supporters of de Vries, I suppose they put his case as strongly as possible. Professor Hubrecht's paper is by far the clearest and the best written, and he says distinctly that de Vries claims that all new species have been produced by mutations, and none by "fluctuating variations." Professor Hubrecht supports this and says that de Vries has proved it! And all this founded upon a few "sports" from one species of plant, itself of doubtful origin (variety or hybrid), and offering phenomena in no way different from scores of other cultivated plants. Never, I should think, has such a vast hypothetical structure been erected on so flimsy a basis!

The boldness of his statements is amazing, as when he declares (as if it were a fact of observation) that fluctuating variability, though he admits it as the origin of all domestic animals and plants, yet "never leads to the formation of species"! (Hubrecht, p. 216.) There is one point where he so grossly misinterprets your father that I think you or some other botanist should point it out. De Vries is said to quote from "Life and Letters," II., p. 83, where Darwin refers to "chance variations"--explained three lines on as "the slight differences selected by which a race or species is at length formed." Yet de Vries and Hubrecht claim that by "chance variations" Darwin meant "sports" or "mutations," and therefore agrees with de Vries, while both omit to refer to the many passages in which, later, he gave less and less weight to what he termed "single large variations"--the same as de Vries' "mutations"!--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO SIR JOSEPH HOOKER

_Broadstone, Wimborne. November 10, 1905._

My dear Sir Joseph,--I am writing to apologise for a great oversight. When I sent my publishers a list of persons who had contributed to "My Life" in various ways, your name, which should have been _first_, was strangely omitted, and the omission was only recalled to me yesterday by reading your letters to Bates in Clodd's edition of his Amazon book, which I have just purchased. I now send you a copy by parcel-post, in the hope that you will excuse the omission to send it sooner.

Now for a more interesting subject, I was extremely pleased and even greatly surprised, in reading your letters to Bates, to find that at that early period (1862) you were already strongly convinced of three facts which are absolutely essential to a comprehension of the method of organic evolution, but which many writers, even now, almost wholly ignore. They are (1) the universality and large amount of normal variability, (2) the extreme rigour of Natural Selection, and (3) that there is no adequate evidence for, and very much against, the inheritance of acquired characters.

It was only some years later, when I began to write on the subject and had to think out the exact mode of action of Natural Selection, that I myself arrived at (1) and (2), and have ever since dwelt upon them--in season and out of season, as many will think--as being absolutely essential to a comprehension of organic evolution. The third I did not realise till I read Weismann, I have never seen the sufficiency of normal variability for the modification of species more strongly or better put than in your letters to Bates. Darwin himself never realised it, and consequently played into the hands of the "discontinuous variation" and "mutation" men, by so continually saying "_if_ they vary"--"without variation Natural Selection can do nothing," etc.

Your argument that variations are not caused by change of environment is equally forcible and convincing. Has anybody answered de Vries yet?

F. Darwin lent me Prof. Hubrecht's review from the _Popular Science Monthly_, in which he claims that de Vries has proved that new species have always been produced from "mutations," never through normal variability, and that Darwin latterly agreed with him! This is to me amazing! The Americans too accept de Vries as a second Darwin!--Yours very sincerely,

ALFRED E. WALLACE.

* * * * *

SIR J. HOOKER TO A.R. WALLACE

_The Camp, Sunningdale. November 12, 1905._

My dear Wallace,--My return from a short holiday at Sidmouth last Thursday was greeted by your kind and welcome letter and copy of your "Life." The latter was, I assure you, never expected, knowing as I do the demand for free copies that such a work inflicts on the writer. In fact I had put it down as one of the annual Christmas gifts of books that I receive from my own family. Coming, as it thus did, quite unexpectedly, it is doubly welcome, and I do heartily thank you for this proof of your greatly valued friendship. It will prove to be one of four works of greatest interest to me of any published since Darwin's "Origin," the others being Waddell's "Lhasa," Scott's "Antarctic Voyage," and Mill's "Siege of the South Pole."

I have not seen Clodd's edition of Bates's "Amazon," which I have put down as to be got, and I had no idea that I should have appeared in it. Your citation of my letters and their contents are like dreams to me; but to tell you the truth, I am getting dull of memory as well as of hearing, and what is worse, in reading: what goes in at one eye goes out at the other. So I am getting to realise Darwin's consolation of old age, that it absolves me from being expected to know, remember, or reason upon new facts and discoveries. And this must apply to your query as to anyone having as yet answered de Vries. I cannot remember having seen any answer; only criticisms of a discontinuous sort. I cannot for a moment entertain the idea that Darwin ever assented to the proposition that new species have always been produced from mutation and never through normal variability. Possibly there is some quibble on the definition of mutation or of variation. The Americans are prone to believe any new things, witness their swallowing the thornless cactus produced by that man in California--I forget his name--which Kew exposed by asking for specimens to exhibit in the Cactus House....--I am, my dear Wallace, sincerely yours,

JOS. D. HOOKER.

* * * * *

TO MR. E. SMEDLEY

_Broadstone, Wimborne. January 31, 1906._

Dear Mr. Smedley,--I have read Oliver Lodge's book in answer to Haeckel, but I do not think it very well done or at all clearly written or well argued. A book[32] has been sent me, however, which is a masterpiece of clearness and sound reasoning on such difficult questions, and is a far more crushing reply to Haeckel than O. Lodge's. I therefore send you a copy, and feel sure you will enjoy it. It is a stiff piece of reasoning, and wants close attention and careful thought, but I think you will be able to appreciate it. In my opinion it comes as near to an intelligible solution of these great problems of the Universe as we are likely to get while on earth. It is a book to read and think over, and read again. It is a masterpiece....--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Broadstone, Wimborne. July 27, 1907._

My dear Poulton,--Thanks for your very interesting letter. I am glad to hear you have a new book on "Evolution"[33] nearly ready and that in it you will do something to expose the fallacies of the Mutationists and Mendelians, who pose before the world as having got _all_ wisdom, before which we poor Darwinians must hide our diminished heads!

Wishing to know the best that could be said for these latter-day anti-Darwinians, I have just been reading Lock's book on "Variation, Heredity, and Evolution." In the early part of his book he gives a tolerably fair account of Natural Selection, etc. But he gradually turns to Mendelism as the "one thing needful"--stating that there can be "no sort of doubt" that Mendel's paper is the "most important" contribution of its size ever made to biological science!

"Mutation," as a theory, is absolutely nothing new--only the assertion that new species originate _always_ in sports, for which the evidence adduced is the most meagre and inconclusive of any ever set forth with such pretentious claims! I hope you will thoroughly expose this absurd claim.

Mendelism is something new, and within its very limited range, important, as leading to conceptions as to the causes and laws of heredity, but only misleading when adduced as the true origin of species in nature, as to which it seems to me to have no part.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Broadstone, Wimborne. November 26, 1907._

My dear Poulton,--Many thanks for letting me see the proofs.[34] ... The whole reads very clearly, and I am delighted with the way you expose the Mendelian and Mutational absurd claims. That ought to really open the eyes of the newspaper men to the fact that Natural Selection and Darwinism are not only holding their ground but are becoming more firmly established than ever by every fresh research into the ways and workings of living nature. I shall look forward to great pleasure in reading the whole book. I was greatly pleased with Archdall Reid's view of Mendelism in _Nature_.[35] He is a very clear and original thinker.

I see in Essay X. you use in the title the term "defensive coloration." Why this instead of the usual "protective"? Surely the whole function of such colours and markings is to protect from attack--not to defend when attacked. The latter is the function of stings, spines and hard coats. I only mention this because using different terms may lead to some misconception.

Your illustration of mutation by throwing colours on a screen, and the argument founded on it, I liked much. That reminds me that H. Spencer's argument for inheritance of acquired variations--that co-ordination of many parts at once, required for adaptations, would be impossible by chance variations of those parts--applies with a hundredfold force to mutations, which are admittedly so much less frequent both in their numbers and the repetitions of them.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Broadstone, Wimborne. December 18, 1907._

My dear Poulton,--The importance of Mendelism to Evolution seems to me to be something of the same kind, but very much less in degree and importance, as Galton's fine discovery of the law of the average share each parent has in the characters of the child--one quarter, the four grandparents each one-sixteenth, and so on. That illuminates the whole problem of heredity, combined with individual diversity, in a way nothing else does. I almost wish you could introduce that!--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO DR. ARCHDALL REID

_Broadstone, Wimborne. January 19, 1908._

Dear Sir,-- ... I was much pleased the other day to read, in a review of Mr. T. Rice Holmes's fine work on "Ancient Britain and the Invasions of Julius Cæsar," that the author has arrived by purely historical study at the conclusion that we have not risen morally above our primitive ancestors. It is a curious and important coincidence.

I myself got the germ of the idea many years ago, from a very acute thinker, Mr. Albert Mott, who gave some very original and thoughtful addresses as President of the Liverpool Philosophical Society, one of which dealt with the question of savages being often, perhaps always, the descendants of more civilised races, and therefore affording no proof of progression. At that time (about 1860-70) I could not accept the view, but I have now come to think he was right.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Wimborne. November 2, 1908._

My dear Poulton,-- ... You may perhaps have heard that I have been invited by the Royal Institution (through Sir W. Crookes) to give them a lecture on the jubilee of the "Origin of Species" in January, After some consideration I accepted, because I _think_ I can give a broad and general view of Darwinism, that will finally squash up the Mutationists and Mendelians, and be both generally intelligible and interesting. So far as I know this has never yet been done, and the Royal Institution audience is just the intelligent and non-specialist one I shall be glad to give it to if I can.

I have been very poorly the last three weeks, but am now recovering my health and strength slowly. It will take me all my time the next two months to get this ready, and now I must write a letter in reply to the absurd and gross misrepresentation of Prof. Hubrecht, as to imaginary differences between Darwin and myself, in the last _Contemporary_!--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

The next letter relates to Wallace's Friday evening Discourse at the Royal Institution. His friends were afraid whether his voice could be sustained throughout the hour--fears which were abundantly dispelled by the actual performance. This was his last public lecture.

TO PROF. MELDOLA

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Wimborne. December 20, 1908._

My dear Meldola,--Thanks for your kind offer to read for me if necessary. But when Sir Wm. Crookes first wrote to me about it, he offered to read all, or any parts of the lecture, if my voice did not hold out. I am very much afraid I cannot stand the strain of speaking beyond my natural tone for an hour, or even for half that time--but I may be able to do the opening and conclusion....

I am glad that you see, as I do, the utter futility of the claims of the Mutationists. I may just mention them in the lecture, but I hope I have put the subject in such a way that even "the meanest capacity" will suffice to see the absurdity of their claims.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Wimborne. January 26, 1909._

My dear Poulton,--I had a delightful two hours at the Museum on Saturday morning, as Mr. Rothschild brought from Tring several of his glass-bottomed drawers with his finest new New Guinea butterflies. They _were_ a treat! I never saw anything more lovely and interesting!...

As to your very kind and pressing invitation,[36] I am sorry to be obliged to decline it. I cannot remain more than one day or night away from home, without considerable discomfort, and all the attractions of your celebration are, to me, repulsions....

My lecture, even as it will be published in the _Fortnightly_, will be far too short for exposition of all the points I wish to discuss, and I hope to occupy myself during this year in saying all I want to say in a book (of a wider scope) which is already arranged for. One of the great points, which I just touched on in the lecture, is to show that all that is usually considered the waste of Nature--the enormous number produced in proportion to the few that survive--was absolutely essential in order to secure the variety and continuity of life through all the ages, and especially of that one line of descent which culminated in man. That, I think, is a subject no one has yet dealt with.--Yours very faithfully,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Wimborne. March 1, 1909._

Dear Poulton,-- ... I am glad that Lankester has replied to the almost disgraceful Centenary article in the _Times_. But it is an illustration of the widespread mischief the Mutationists, etc., are doing. I have no doubt, however, it will all come right in the end, though the end may be far off, and in the meantime we must simply go on, and show, at every opportunity, that Darwinism actually does explain the whole fields of phenomena that they do not even attempt to deal with, or even approach....--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO MRS. FISHER

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Wimborne. March 6, 1909._

Dear Mrs. Fisher,-- ... Another point I am becoming more and more impressed with is, a teleology of fundamental laws and forces rendering development of the infinity of life-forms possible (and certain) in place of the old teleology applied to the production of each species. Such are the case of feathers reproduced annually, which I gave at end of lecture, and the still more marvellous fact of the caterpillar, often in two or three weeks of chrysalis life, having its whole internal, muscular, nervous, locomotive and alimentary organs decomposed and recomposed into a totally different being--an absolute miracle if ever there is one, quite as wonderful as would be the production of a complex marine organism out of a mass of protoplasm. Yet, because there has been continuity, the difficulty is slurred over or thought to be explained!--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO SIR W.T. THISELTON-DYER

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Wimborne. June 22, 1909._

Dear Sir William,--On Saturday, to my great pleasure, I received a copy of the Darwin Commemoration volume. I at once began reading your most excellent paper on the Geographical Distribution of Plants. It is intensely interesting to me, both because it so clearly brings out Darwin's views and so judiciously expounds his arguments--even when you intimate a difference of opinion--but especially because you bring out so clearly and strongly his views on the general permanence of continents and oceans, which to-day, as much as ever, wants insisting upon. I may just mention here that none of the people who still insist on former continents where now are deep oceans have ever dealt with the almost physical impossibility of such a change having occurred without breaking the continuity of terrestrial life, owing to the mean depth of the ocean being at least six times the mean height of the land, and its area nearly three times, so that the whole mass of the land of the existing continents would be required to build up even _one small_ continent in the depths of the Atlantic or Pacific! I have demonstrated this, with a diagram, in my "Darwinism" (Chap, XII.), and it has never been either refuted or noticed, but passed by as if it did not exist! Your whole discussion of Dispersal and Distribution is also admirable, and I was much interested with your quotations from Guppy, whose book I have not seen, but must read.

Most valuable to me also are your numerous references to Darwin's letters, so that the article serves as a compendious index to the five volumes, as regards this subject.

Especially admirable is the way in which you have always kept Darwin before us as the centre of the whole discussion, while at the same time fairly stating the sometimes adverse views of those who differ from him on certain points....--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

SIR W.T. THISELTON-DYER TO A.R. WALLACE

_The Ferns, Witcombe, Gloucester. June 25, 1909._

Dear Dr. Wallace,--It is difficult for me to tell you how gratified I am by your extraordinarily kind letter.... The truth is that success was easy. It has been my immense good fortune to know most of those who played in the drama. The story simply wanted a straightforward amanuensis to tell itself. But it is a real pleasure to me to know that I have met with some measure of success.

There are many essays in the book that you will not like any more than I do. The secret of this lies in the fact, which you pointed out in your memorable speech at the Linnean Celebration, that no one but a naturalist can really understand Darwin.

I did not go to Cambridge--I had my hands full here. I was not sorry for the excuse. There seemed to me a note of insincerity about the whole business. I am short-tempered. I cannot stand being told that the origin of species has still to be discovered, and that specific differences have no "reality" (Bateson's Essay, p. 89). People are of course at liberty to hold such opinions, but decency might have presented another occasion for ventilating them.--Yours sincerely,

W.T. THISELTON-DYER.

* * * * *

SIR W.T. THISELTON-DYER TO A.R. WALLACE

_The Ferns, Witcombe, Gloucester. July 11, 1909._

Dear Mr. Wallace,-- ... I have just got F. Darwin's "Foundations." He tries to make out that his father could have dispensed with Malthus. But the selection death-rate in a slightly varying large population is _the_ pith of the whole business. The Darwin-Wallace theory is, as you say, "the continuous adjustment of the organic to the inorganic world." It is what mathematicians call "a moving equilibrium." In fact, I have always maintained that it is a mathematical conception.

It seemed to me there was a touch of insincerity about the whole celebration,[37] as the younger Cambridge School as a whole do not even begin to understand the theory.... I take it that the reason is, as you pointed out, that none of them are naturalists.--Yours sincerely,

W.T. THISELTON-DYER.

* * * * *

TO DR. ARCHDALL REID

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Dorset. December 28, 1909._

Dear Dr. Archdall Reid,--Many thanks for your very interesting and complimentary letter. I am very glad to hear of your new book, which I doubt not will be very interesting and instructive. The subjects you treat are, however, so very complex, and require so much accurate knowledge of the facts, and so much sound reasoning upon them, that I cannot possibly undertake the labour and thought required before I should feel justified in expressing an opinion upon your treatment of them....

I rejoice to hear that you have exposed the fallacy of the claims of the Mendelians. I have also tried to do so, but I find it quite impossible for me to follow their detailed studies and arguments. It wants a mathematical mind, which I have not.

But on the general relation of Mendelism to Evolution I have come to a very definite conclusion. This is, that it has no relation whatever to the evolution of species or higher groups, but is really antagonistic to such evolution! The essential basis of evolution, involving as it does the most minute and all-pervading adaptation to the whole environment, is extreme and ever-present plasticity, as a condition of survival and adaptation. But the essence of Mendelian characters is their rigidity. They are transmitted without variation, and therefore, except by the rarest of accidents, can never become adapted to ever-varying conditions. Moreover, when crossed they reproduce the same pair of types in the same proportions as at first, and therefore without selection; they are antagonistic to evolution by continually reproducing injurious or useless characters--which is the reason they are so rarely found in nature, but are mostly artificial breeds or sports. My view is, therefore, that Mendelian characters are of the nature of abnormalities or monstrosities, and that the "Mendelian laws" serve the purpose of eliminating them when, as usually, they are not useful, and thus preventing them from interfering with the normal process of natural selection and adaptation of the more plastic races. I am also glad to hear of your new argument for non-inheritance of acquired characters.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO SIR W.T. THISELTON-DYER

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Wimborne, February 8, 1911._

Dear Sir W. Thiselton-Dyer,--I thank you very much for taking so much trouble as you have done in writing your views of my new book.[38] I am glad to find that you agree with much of what I have said in the more evolutionary part of it, and that you differ only on some of my suggested interpretations of the facts. I have always felt the disadvantage I have been under--more especially during the last twenty years--in having not a single good biologist anywhere near me, with whom I could discuss matters of theory or obtain information as to matters of fact. I am therefore the more pleased that you do not seem to have come across any serious misstatements in the botanical portions, as to which I have had to trust entirely to second-hand information, often obtained through a long and varied correspondence.

As to your disagreement from me in the conclusions arrived at and strenuously advocated in the latter portions of my work, I am not surprised. I am afraid, now, that I have not expressed myself sufficiently clearly as to the fundamental phenomena which seem to me absolutely to necessitate a guiding mind and organising power. Hardly one of my critics (I think absolutely not one) has noticed the distinction I have tried and intended to draw between Evolution on the one hand, and the fundamental powers and properties of Life--growth, assimilation, reproduction, heredity, etc.--on the other. In Evolution I recognise the action of Natural Selection as universal and capable of explaining all the facts of the continuous development of species from species, "from amoeba to man." But this, as Darwin, Weismann, Kerner, Lloyd-Morgan, and even Huxley have seen, has nothing whatever to do with the basic mysteries of life--growth, etc. etc. The chemists think they have done wonders when they have produced in their laboratories certain organic substances--always by the use of other organic products--which life builds up within each organism, and from the few simple elements available in air, earth, and water, innumerable structures--bone, horn, hair, skin, blood, muscle, etc. etc.; and these are not amorphous--mere lumps of dead matter--but organised to serve certain definite purposes in each living organism. I have dwelt on this in my chapter on "The Mystery of the Cell." Now I have been unable to find any attempt by any biologist or physiologist to grapple with this problem. One and all, they shirk it, or simply state it to be insoluble. It is here that I state guidance and organising power are essential. My little physiological parable or allegory (p. 296) I think sets forth the difficulty fairly, though by no means adequately, yet not one of about fifty reviews I have read even mentions it.

If you know of any writer of sufficient knowledge and mental power, who has fully recognised and fairly grappled with this fundamental problem, I should be very glad to be referred to him. I have been able to find no approach to it. Yet I am at once howled at, or sneered at, for pointing out the facts that such problems exist, that they are not in any way touched by Evolution, but are far before it, and the forces, laws and agencies involved are those of existences possessed of powers, mental and physical, far beyond those mere mechanical, physical, or chemical forces we see at work in nature....--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

SIR W.T. THISELTON-DYER TO A.R. WALLACE

_The Ferns, Witcombe, Gloucester. February 12, 1911._

Dear Mr. Wallace,-- ... You must let me correct you on one technical point in your letter. It is no longer possible to say that chemists effect the synthesis of organic products "by the use of other organic substances." From what has been already effected, it cannot be doubted that eventually every organic substance will be built up from "the few simple elements available in air, earth and water." I think you may take it from me that this does not admit of dispute....

At any rate we are in agreement as to Natural Selection being capable of explaining evolution "from amoeba to man."

It is generally admitted that that is a mechanical or scientific explanation. That is to say, it invokes nothing but intelligible actions and causes.

De Vries, however, asserts that the Darwinian theory is _not_ scientific at all, and that is of course a position he has a right to take up.

But if we admit that it is scientific, then we are precluded from admitting a "directive power."

This was von Baer's position, also that of Kant and of Weismann.

But von Baer remarks that the naturalist is not precluded from asking "whether the _totality_ of details leads him to a general and final basis of intentional design." I have no objection to this, and offer it as an olive-branch which you can throw to your howling and sneering critics.

As to "structures organised to serve certain definite purposes," surely they offer no more difficulty as regards "scientific" explanation than the apparatus by which an orchid is fertilised.

We can work back to the amoeba to find ourselves face to face with a scarcely organised mass of protoplasm. And then we find ourselves face to face with a problem which will, perhaps, for ever remain insoluble scientifically. But as for that, so is the primeval material of which it (protoplasm) is composed. "Matter" itself is evaporating, for it is being resolved by physical research into something which is intangible.

We cannot form the slightest idea how protoplasm came into existence. It is impossible to regard it as a mere substance. It is a mechanism. Although the chemist may hope to make eventually all the substances which protoplasm fabricates, and will probably do so, he can only build them up by the most complicated processes. Protoplasm appears to be able to manufacture them straight off in a way of which the chemist cannot form the slightest conception. This is one aspect of the mystery of _life_. Herbert Spencer's definition tells one nothing.

Science can only explain nature as it reveals itself to the senses in terms of consciousness. The explanation may be all wrong in the eyes of omniscience. All one can say is that it is a practical working basis, and is good enough for mundane purposes. But if I am asked if I can solve the riddle of the Universe I can only answer, No. Brunetière then retorts that science is bankrupt. But this is equivocal. It only means that it cannot meet demands beyond its power to satisfy.

I entirely sympathise with anyone who seeks an answer from some other non-scientific source. But I keep scientific explanations and spiritual craving wholly distinct.

The whole point of evolution, as formulated by Lyell and Darwin, is to explain phenomena by known causes. Now, directive power is not a known cause. Determinism compels me to believe that every event is inevitable. If we admit a directive power, the order of nature becomes capricious and unintelligible. Excuse my saying all this. But that is the dilemma as it presents itself to _my_ mind. If it does not trouble other people, I can only say, so much the better for them. Briefly, I am afraid I must say that it is ultra-scientific. I think that would have been pretty much Darwin's view.

I do not think that it is quite fair to say that biologists shirk the problem. In my opinion they are not called upon to face it. Bastian, I suppose, believed that he had bridged the gulf between lifeless and living matter. And here is a man, of whom I know nothing, who has apparently got the whole thing cut and dried.--Yours sincerely,

W.T. THISELTON-DYER.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Dorset. May 28, 1912._

My dear Poulton,--Thanks for your paper on Darwin and Bergson.[39] I have read nothing of Bergson's, and although he evidently has much in common with my own views, yet all vague ideas--like "an internal development force"--seem to me of no real value as an explanation of Nature.

I claim to have shown the necessity of an ever-present Mind as the primal cause both of all physical and biological evolution. This Mind works by and through the primal forces of nature--by means of Natural Selection in the world of life; and I do not think I could read a book which rejects this method in favour of a vague "law of sympathy." He might as well reject gravitation, electrical repulsion, etc. etc., as explaining the motions of cosmical bodies....--Yours very truly, ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO MR. BEN R. MILLER

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Dorset, January 18, 1913._

Dear Sir,--Thanks for your kind congratulations, and for the small pamphlet[40] you have sent me. I have read it with much interest, as the writer was evidently a man of thought and talent. The first lecture certainly gives an approach to Darwin's theory, perhaps nearer than any other, as he almost implies the "survival of the fittest" as the cause of progressive modification. But his language is imaginative and obscure. He uses "education" apparently in the sense of what we should term "effect of the environment."

The second lecture is even a more exact anticipation of the modern views as to microbes, including their transmission by flies and other insects and the probability that the blood of healthy persons contains a sufficiency of destroyers of the pathogenic germs--such as the white blood-corpuscles--to preserve us in health.

But he is so anti-clerical and anti-Biblical that it is no wonder he could not get a hearing in Boston in 1847.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Dorset. April 2, 1913._

My dear Poulton,--About two months ago an American ... sent me the enclosed booklet,[41] which he had been told was very rare, and contained an anticipation of Darwinism.

This it certainly does, but the writer was highly imaginative, and, like all the other anticipators of Darwin, did not perceive the whole scope of his idea, being, as he himself says, not sufficiently acquainted with the facts of nature.

His anticipations, however, of diverging lines of descent from a common ancestor, and of the transmission of disease germs by means of insects, are perfectly clear and very striking.

As you yourself made known one of the anticipators of Darwin, whom he himself had overlooked, you are the right person to make this known in any way you think proper. As you have so recently been in America, you might perhaps ascertain from the librarian of the public library in Boston, or from some of your biological friends there, what is known of the writer and of his subsequent history.

If the house at Down is ever dedicated to Darwin's memory it would seem best to preserve this little book there; if not you can dispose of it as you think best.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

P.S.--Two of my books have been translated into Japanese: will you ascertain whether the Bodleian would like to have them?

* * * * *

TO PROF. POULTON[42]

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Dorset, June 3, 1913._

My dear Poulton,--I am very glad you have changed your view about the "Sleeper" lectures being a "fake." The writer was too earnest, and too clear a thinker, to descend to any such trick. And for what? "Agnostic" is not in Shakespeare, but it may well have been used by someone before Huxley. The parts of your Address of which you send me slips are excellent, and I am sure will be of great interest to your audience. I quite agree with your proposal that the "Lectures" shall be given to the Linnean Society.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO MR. E. SMEDLEY

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Dorset. August 26, 1913._

Dear Mr. Smedley,--I am glad to see you looking so jolly. I return the photo to give to some other friend. Mr. Marchant, the lecturer you heard, is a great friend of mine, but is now less dogmatic. The Piltdown skull does not prove much, if anything!

The papers are wrong about me. I am not writing anything now; perhaps shall write no more. Too many letters and home business. Too much bothered with many slight ailments, which altogether keep me busy attending to them. I am like Job, who said "the grasshopper was a burthen" to him! I suppose its creaking song.--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.

* * * * *

TO MR. W.J. FARMER

_Old Orchard, Broadstone, Wimborne. 1913._

Dear Sir,-- ... I presume your question "Why?" as to the varying colour of individual hairs and feathers, and the regular varying of adjacent hairs, etc., to form the surface pattern, applies to the ultimate cause which enables those patterns to be hereditary, and, in the case of birds, to be reproduced after moulting yearly.

The purpose, or end they serve, I have, I think, sufficiently dealt with in my "Darwinism"; the method by which such useful tints and markings are produced, because useful, is, I think, clearly explained by the law of Natural Selection or Survival of the Fittest, acting through the universal facts of heredity and variation.

But the "why"--which goes further back, to the directing agency which not only brings each special cell of the highly complex structure of a feather into its exactly right position, but, further, carries pigments or produces surface striæ (in the case of the metallic or interference colours) also to their exactly right place, and nowhere else--is the mystery, which, if we knew, we should (as Tennyson said of the flower in the wall) "know what God and Man is."

The idea that "cells" are all conscious beings and go to their right places has been put forward by Butler in his wonderful book "Life and Habit," and now even Haeckel seems to adopt it. All theories of heredity, including Darwin's pangenesis, do not touch it, and it seems to me as fundamental as life and consciousness, and to be absolutely inconceivable by us till we know what life is, what spirit is, and what matter is; and it is probable that we must develop in the spirit world some few thousand million years before we get to this knowledge--if then!

My book, "Man's Place in the Universe," shows, I think, indications of the vast importance of that Universe as the producer of Man which so many scientific men to-day try to belittle, because of what may be, in the infinite!--Yours very truly,

ALFRED R. WALLACE.