Chapter 195

Have you seen Bentham's remarks on species in his address to the Linnean Society? (171/1. Presidential address before the Linnean Society by G. Bentham ("Journ. Proc. Linn. Soc." Volume VII., page xi., 1864).) they have pleased me more than anything I have read for some time. I have no news, for I have not seen a soul for months, and have had a bad spring and summer, but have managed to do a good deal of work. Emma is threatening me to take me to Malvern, and perhaps I shall be compelled, but it is a horrid waste of time; you must have enjoyed North Wales, I should think, it is to me a most glorious country...

If you have not read Bates' book (171/2. Henry Walter Bates, "The Naturalist on the River Amazons," 2 volumes, London, 1863. In a letter to Bates, April 18th, 1863, Darwin writes, "It is the best work of natural history travels ever published in England" ("Life and Letters," II., page 381.), I think it would interest you. He is second only to Humboldt in describing a tropical forest. (171/3. Quoted in "Life and Letters," II., page 381.). Talking of reading, I have never got the "Edinburgh" (171/4. The "Geological Evidence of the Antiquity of Man," by Sir Charles Lyell, and works by other authors reviewed in the "Edinburgh Review." Volume CXVIII., July 1863. The writer sums up his criticism as follows: "Glancing at the work of Sir Charles Lyell as a whole, it leaves the impression on our minds that we have been reading an ingenious academical thesis, rather than a work of demonstration by an original writer...There is no argument in it, and only a few facts which have not been stated elsewhere by Sir C. Lyell himself or by others" (loc. cit., page 294).), in which, I suppose, you are cut up.