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Rh plants through man's agency in foreign lands. It might have been expected that the plants which have succeeded in becoming naturalised in any land would generally have been closely allied to the indigenes; for these are commonly looked at as specially created and adapted for their own country. It might, also, perhaps have been expected that naturalised plants would have belonged to a few groups more especially adapted to certain stations in their new homes. But the case is very different; and Alph. De Candolle has well remarked in his great and admirable work, that floras gain by naturalisation, proportionally with the number of the native genera and species, far more in new genera than in new species. To give a single instance: in the last edition of Dr. Asa Gray's 'Manual of the Flora of the Northern United States,' 260 naturalised plants are enumerated, and these belong to 162 genera. We thus see that these naturalised plants are of a highly diversified nature. They differ, moreover, to a large extent from the indigenes, for out of the 162 genera, no less than 100 genera are not there indigenous, and thus a large proportional addition is made to the genera of these States.

By considering the nature of the plants or animals which have struggled successfully with the indigenes of any country, and have there become naturalised, we can gain some crude idea in what manner some of the natives would have had to be modified, in order to have gained an advantage over the other natives; and we may, I think, at least safely infer that diversification of structure, amounting to new generic differences, would have been profitable to them.

The advantage of diversification in the inhabitants of the same region is, in fact, the same as that of the physiological division of labour in the organs of the same individual body—a subject so well elucidated by


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116 Milne Edwards. No physiologist doubts that a stomach by being adapted to digest vegetable matter alone, or flesh alone, draws most nutriment from these substances. So in the general economy of any land, the more widely and perfectly the animals and plants are diversified for different habits of life, so will a greater number of individuals be capable of there supporting themselves. A set of animals, with their organisation but little diversified, could hardly compete with a set more perfectly diversified in structure. It may be doubted, for instance, whether the Australian marsupials, which are divided into groups differing but little from each other, and feebly representing, as Mr. Waterhouse and others have remarked, our carnivorous, ruminant, and rodent mammals, could successfully compete with these well-pronounced orders. In the Australian mammals, we see the process of diversification in an early and incomplete stage of development.

After the foregoing discussion, which ought to have been much amplified, we may, I think, assume that the modified descendants of any one species will succeed by so much the better as they become more diversified in structure, and are thus enabled to encroach on places occupied by other beings. Now let us see how this principle of great benefit being derived from divergence of character, combined with the principles of natural selection and of extinction, will tend to act.

The accompanying diagram will aid us in understanding this rather perplexing subject. Let A to L represent the species of a genus large in its own country; these species are supposed to resemble each other in unequal degrees, as is so generally the case in nature, and as is represented in the diagram by the letters standing at unequal distances. I have said a large genus, because we have seen in the second chapter,

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Rh that on an average more of the species of large genera vary than of small genera; and the varying species of the large genera present a greater number of varieties. We have, also, seen that the species, which are the commonest and the most widely-diffused, vary more than rare species with restricted ranges. Let (A) be a common, widely-diffused, and varying species, belonging to a genus large in its own country. The little fan of diverging dotted lines of unequal lengths proceeding from (A), may represent its varying offspring. The variations are supposed to be extremely slight, but of the most diversified nature; they are not supposed all to appear simultaneously, but often after long intervals of time; nor are they all supposed to endure for equal periods. Only those variations which are in some way profitable will be preserved or naturally selected. And here the importance of the principle of benefit being derived from divergence of character comes in; for this will generally lead to the most different or divergent variations (represented by the outer dotted lines) being preserved and accumulated by natural selection. When a dotted line reaches one of the horizontal lines, and is there marked by a small numbered letter, a sufficient amount of variation is supposed to have been accumulated to have formed a fairly well-marked variety, such as would be thought worthy of record in a systematic work.

The intervals between the horizontal lines in the diagram, may represent each a thousand generations; but it would have been better if each had represented ten thousand generations. After a thousand generations, species (A) is supposed to have produced two fairly well-marked varieties, namely a1 and m1. These two varieties will generally continue to be exposed to the same conditions which made their parents variable,


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118 and the tendency to variability is in itself hereditary, consequently they will tend to vary, and generally to vary in nearly the same manner as their parents varied. Moreover, these two varieties, being only slightly modified forms, will tend to inherit those advantages which made their common parent (A) more numerous than most of the other inhabitants of the same country; they will likewise partake of those more general advantages which made the genus to which the parent-species belonged, a large genus in its own country. And these circumstances we know to be favourable to the production of new varieties.

If, then, these two varieties be variable, the most divergent of their variations will generally be preserved during the next thousand generations. And after this interval, variety a1 is supposed in the diagram to have produced variety a2, which will, owing to the principle of divergence, differ more from (A) than did variety a1. Variety m1 is supposed to have produced two varieties, namely m2 and s2, differing from each other, and more considerably from their common parent (A). We may continue the process by similar steps for any length of time; some of the varieties, after each thousand generations, producing only a single variety, but in a more and more modified condition, some producing two or three varieties, and some failing to produce any. Thus the varieties or modified descendants, proceeding from the common parent (A), will generally go on increasing in number and diverging in character. In the diagram the process is represented up to the ten-thousandth generation, and under a condensed and simplified form up to the fourteen-thousandth generation.

But I must here remark that I do not suppose that the process ever goes on so regularly as is represented in the diagram, though in itself made somewhat irregular.


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Rh I am far from thinking that the most divergent varieties will invariably prevail and multiply: a medium form may often long endure, and may or may not produce more than one modified descendant; for natural selection will always act according to the nature of the places which are either unoccupied or not perfectly occupied by other beings; and this will depend on infinitely complex relations. But as a general rule, the more diversified in structure the descendants from any one species can be rendered, the more places they will be enabled to seize on, and the more their modified progeny will be increased. In our diagram the line of succession is broken at regular intervals by small numbered letters marking the successive forms which have become sufficiently distinct to be recorded as varieties. But these breaks are imaginary, and might have been inserted anywhere, after intervals long enough to have allowed the accumulation of a considerable amount of divergent variation.

As all the modified descendants from a common and widely-diffused species, belonging to a large genus, will tend to partake of the same advantages which made their parent successful in life, they will generally go on multiplying in number as well as diverging in character: this is represented in the diagram by the several divergent branches proceeding from (A). The modified offspring from the later and more highly improved branches in the lines of descent, will, it is probable, often take the place of, and so destroy, the earlier and less improved branches: this is represented in the diagram by some of the lower branches not reaching to the upper horizontal lines. In some cases I do not doubt that the process of modification will be confined to a single line of descent, and the number of the descendants will not be increased; although the amount


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120 of divergent modification may have been increased in the successive generations. This case would be represented in the diagram, if all the lines proceeding from (A) were removed, excepting that from a1 to a10. In the same way, for instance, the English race-horse and English pointer have apparently both gone on slowly diverging in character from their original stocks, without either having given off any fresh branches or races.

After ten thousand generations, species (A) is supposed to have produced three forms, a10, f10, and m10, which, from having diverged in character during the successive generations, will have come to differ largely, but perhaps unequally, from each other and from their common parent. If we suppose the amount of change between each horizontal line in our diagram to be excessively small, these three forms may still be only well-marked varieties; or they may have arrived at the doubtful category of sub-species; but we have only to suppose the steps in the process of modification to be more numerous or greater in amount, to convert these three forms into well-defined species: thus the diagram illustrates the steps by which the small differences distinguishing varieties are increased into the larger differences distinguishing species. By continuing the same process for a greater number of generations (as shown in the diagram in a condensed and simplified manner), we get eight species, marked by the letters between a14 and m14, all descended from (A). Thus, as I believe, species are multiplied and genera are formed.

In a large genus it is probable that more than one species would vary. In the diagram I have assumed that a second species (I) has produced, by analogous steps, after ten thousand generations, either two well-marked varieties (w10 and z10) or two species, according to the amount of change supposed to be represented


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Rh the horizontal lines. After fourteen thousand generations, six new species, marked by the letters n14 to z14, are supposed to have been produced. In each genus, the species, which are already extremely different in character, will generally tend to produce the greatest number of modified descendants; for these will have the best chance of filling new and widely different places in the polity of nature: hence in the diagram I have chosen the extreme species (A), and the nearly extreme species (I), as those which have largely varied, and have given rise to new varieties and species. The other nine species (marked by capital letters) of our original genus, may for a long period continue transmitting unaltered descendants; and this is shown in the diagram by the dotted lines not prolonged far upwards from want of space.

But during the process of modification, represented in the diagram, another of our principles, namely that of extinction, will have played an important part. As in each fully stocked country natural selection necessarily acts by the selected form having some advantage in the struggle for life over other forms, there will be a constant tendency in the improved descendants of any one species to supplant and exterminate in each stage of descent their predecessors and their original parent. For it should be remembered that the competition will generally be most severe between those forms which are most nearly related to each other in habits, constitution, and structure. Hence all the intermediate forms between the earlier and later states, that is between the less and more improved state of a species, as well as the original parent-species itself, will generally tend to become extinct. So it probably will be with many whole collateral lines of descent, which will be conquered by later and improved lines of descent. If, however, the


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122 modified offspring of a species get into some distinct country, or become quickly adapted to some quite new station, in which child and parent do not come into competition, both may continue to exist.

If then our diagram be assumed to represent a considerable amount of modification, species (A) and all the earlier varieties will have become extinct, having been replaced by eight new species (a14 to m14); and (I) will have been replaced by six (n14 to z14) new species.

But we may go further than this. The original species of our genus were supposed to resemble each other in unequal degrees, as is so generally the case in nature; species (A) being more nearly related to B, C, and D, than to the other species; and species (I) more to G, H, K, L, than to the others. These two species (A) and (I), were also supposed to be very common and widely diffused species, so that they must originally have had some advantage over most of the other species of the genus. Their modified descendants, fourteen in number at the fourteen-thousandth generation, will probably have inherited some of the same advantages: they have also been modified and improved in a diversified manner at each stage of descent, so as to have become adapted to many related places in the natural economy of their country. It seems, therefore, to me extremely probable that they will have taken the places of, and thus exterminated, not only their parents (A) and (I), but likewise some of the original species which were most nearly related to their parents. Hence very few of the original species will have transmitted offspring to the fourteen-thousandth generation. We may suppose that only one (F), of the two species which were least closely related to the other nine original species, has transmitted descendants to this late stage of descent.


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Rh The new species in our diagram descended from the original eleven species, will now be fifteen in number. Owing to the divergent tendency of natural selection, the extreme amount of difference in character between species a14 and z14 will be much greater than that between the most different of the original eleven species. The new species, moreover, will be allied to each other in a widely different manner. Of the eight descendants from (A) the three marked a14, q14, p14, will be nearly related from having recently branched off from a10; b14 and f14, from having diverged at an earlier period from a5, will be in some degree distinct from the three first-named species; and lastly, o14, e14, and m14, will be nearly related one to the other, but from having diverged at the first commencement of the process of modification, will be widely different from the other five species, and may constitute a sub-genus or even a distinct genus.

The six descendants from (I) will form two sub-genera or even genera. But as the original species (I) differed largely from (A), standing nearly at the extreme points of the original genus, the six descendants from (I) will, owing to inheritance, differ considerably from the eight descendants from (A); the two groups, moreover, are supposed to have gone on diverging in different directions. The intermediate species, also (and this is a very important consideration), which connected the original species (A) and (I), have all become, excepting (F), extinct, and have left no descendants. Hence the six new species descended from (I), and the eight descended from (A), will have to be ranked as very distinct genera, or even as distinct sub-families.

Thus it is, as I believe, that two or more genera are produced by descent, with modification, from two or more species of the same genus. And the two or


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124 more parent-species are supposed to have descended from some one species of an earlier genus. In our diagram, this is indicated by the broken lines, beneath the capital letters, converging in sub-branches downwards towards a single point; this point representing a single species, the supposed single parent of our several new sub-genera and genera.

It is worth while to reflect for a moment on the character of the new species F14, which is supposed not to have diverged much in character, but to have retained the form of (F), either unaltered or altered only in a slight degree. In this case, its affinities to the other fourteen new species will be of a curious and circuitous nature. Having descended from a form which stood between the two parent-species (A) and (I), now supposed to be extinct and unknown, it will be in some degree intermediate in character between the two groups descended from these species. But as these two groups have gone on diverging in character from the type of their parents, the new species (F14) will not be directly intermediate between them, but rather between types of the two groups; and every naturalist will be able to bring some such case before his mind.

In the diagram, each horizontal line has hitherto been supposed to represent a thousand generations, but each may represent a million or hundred million generations, and likewise a section of the successive strata of the earth's crust including extinct remains. We shall, when we come to our chapter on Geology, have to refer again to this subject, and I think we shall then see that the diagram throws light on the affinities of extinct beings, which, though generally belonging to the same orders, or families, or genera, with those now living, yet are often, in some degree, intermediate in character between existing groups; and we can understand this fact, for


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Rh the extinct species lived at very ancient epochs when the branching lines of descent had diverged less.

I see no reason to limit the process of modification, as now explained, to the formation of genera alone. If, in our diagram, we suppose the amount of change represented by each successive group of diverging dotted lines to be very great, the forms marked a14 to p14, those marked b14 and f14, and those marked o14 to m14, will form three very distinct genera. We shall also have two very distinct genera descended from (I); and as these latter two genera, both from continued divergence of character and from inheritance from a different parent, will differ widely from the three genera descended from (A), the two little groups of genera will form two distinct families, or even orders, according to the amount of divergent modification supposed to be represented in the diagram. And the two new families, or orders, will have descended from two species of the original genus; and these two species are supposed to have descended from one species of a still more ancient and unknown genus.

We have seen that in each country it is the species of the larger genera which oftenest present varieties or incipient species. This, indeed, might have been expected; for as natural selection acts through one form having some advantage over other forms in the struggle for existence, it will chiefly act on those which already have some advantage; and the largeness of any group shows that its species have inherited from a common ancestor some advantage in common. Hence, the struggle for the production of new and modified descendants, will mainly lie between the larger groups, which are all trying to increase in number. One large group will slowly conquer another large group, reduce its numbers, and thus lessen its chance of further variation and improvement. Within the same large


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126 group, the later and more highly perfected sub-groups, from branching out and seizing on many new places in the polity of Nature, will constantly tend to supplant and destroy the earlier and less improved sub-groups. Small and broken groups and sub-groups will finally tend to disappear. Looking to the future, we can predict that the groups of organic beings which are now large and triumphant, and which are least broken up, that is, which as yet have suffered least extinction, will for a long period continue to increase. But which groups will ultimately prevail, no man can predict; for we well know that many groups, formerly most extensively developed, have now become extinct. Looking still more remotely to the future, we may predict that, owing to the continued and steady increase of the larger groups, a multitude of smaller groups will become utterly extinct, and leave no modified descendants; and consequently that of the species living at any one period, extremely few will transmit descendants to a remote futurity. I shall have to return to this subject in the chapter on Classification, but I may add that on this view of extremely few of the more ancient species having transmitted descendants, and on the view of all the descendants of the same species making a class, we can understand how it is that there exist but very few classes in each main division of the animal and vegetable kingdoms. Although extremely few of the most ancient species may now have living and modified descendants, yet at the most remote geological period, the earth may have been as well peopled with many species of many genera, families, orders, and classes, as at the present day.

Summary of Chapter.—If during the long course of ages and under varying conditions of life, organic beings


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Rh vary at all in the several parts of their organisation, and I think this cannot be disputed; if there be, owing to the high geometrical powers of increase of each species, at some age, season, or year, a severe struggle for life, and this certainly cannot be disputed; then, considering the infinite complexity of the relations of all organic beings to each other and to their conditions of existence, causing an infinite diversity in structure, constitution, and habits, to be advantageous to them, I think it would be a most extraordinary fact if no variation ever had occurred useful to each being's own welfare, in the same way as so many variations have occurred useful to man. But if variations useful to any organic being do occur, assuredly individuals thus characterised will have the best chance of being preserved in the struggle for life; and from the strong principle of inheritance they will tend to produce offspring similarly characterised. This principle of preservation, I have called, for the sake of brevity, Natural Selection. Natural selection, on the principle of qualities being inherited at corresponding ages, can modify the egg, seed, or young, as easily as the adult. Amongst many animals, sexual selection will give its aid to ordinary selection, by assuring to the most vigorous and best adapted males the greatest number of offspring. Sexual selection will also give characters useful to the males alone, in their struggles with other males.

Whether natural selection has really thus acted in nature, in modifying and adapting the various forms of life to their several conditions and stations, must be judged of by the general tenour and balance of evidence given in the following chapters. But we already see how it entails extinction; and how largely extinction has acted in the world's history, geology plainly declares. Natural selection, also, leads to divergence of


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128 character; for more living beings can be supported on the same area the more they diverge in structure, habits, and constitution, of which we see proof by looking at the inhabitants of any small spot or at naturalised productions. Therefore during the modification of the descendants of any one species, and during the incessant struggle of all species to increase in numbers, the more diversified these descendants become, the better will be their chance of succeeding in the battle of life. Thus the small differences distinguishing varieties of the same species, will steadily tend to increase till they come to equal the greater differences between species of the same genus, or even of distinct genera.

We have seen that it is the common, the widely-diffused, and widely-ranging species, belonging to the larger genera, which vary most; and these will tend to transmit to their modified offspring that superiority which now makes them dominant in their own countries. Natural selection, as has just been remarked, leads to divergence of character and to much extinction of the less improved and intermediate forms of life. On these principles, I believe, the nature of the affinities of all organic beings may be explained. It is a truly wonderful fact—the wonder of which we are apt to overlook from familiarity—that all animals and all plants throughout all time and space should be related to each other in group subordinate to group, in the manner which we everywhere behold—namely, varieties of the same species most closely related together, species of the same genus less closely and unequally related together, forming sections and sub-genera, species of distinct genera much less closely related, and genera related in different degrees, forming sub-families, families, orders, sub-classes, and classes. The several subordinate groups in any class cannot be


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Rh ranked in a single file, but seem rather to be clustered round points, and these round other points, and so on in almost endless cycles. On the view that each species has been independently created, I can see no explanation of this great fact in the classification of all organic beings; but, to the best of my judgment, it is explained through inheritance and the complex action of natural selection, entailing extinction and divergence of character, as we have seen illustrated in the diagram.

The affinities of all the beings of the same class have sometimes been represented by a great tree. I believe this simile largely speaks the truth. The green and budding twigs may represent existing species; and those produced during each former year may represent the long succession of extinct species. At each period of growth all the growing twigs have tried to branch out on all sides, and to overtop and kill the surrounding twigs and branches, in the same manner as species and groups of species have tried to overmaster other species in the great battle for life. The limbs divided into great branches, and these into lesser and lesser branches, were themselves once, when the tree was small, budding twigs; and this connexion of the former and present buds by ramifying branches may well represent the classification of all extinct and living species in groups subordinate to groups. Of the many twigs which flourished when the tree was a mere bush, only two or three, now grown into great branches, yet survive and bear all the other branches; so with the species which lived during long-past geological periods, very few now have living and modified descendants. From the first growth of the tree, many a limb and branch has decayed and dropped off; and these lost branches of various sizes may represent those whole orders, families, and genera which have now no living representatives, and


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130 which are known to us only from having been found in a fossil state. As we here and there see a thin straggling branch springing from a fork low down in a tree, and which by some chance has been favoured and is still alive on its summit, so we occasionally see an animal like the Ornithorhynchus or Lepidosiren, which in some small degree connects by its affinities two large branches of life, and which has apparently been saved from fatal competition by having inhabited a protected station. As buds give rise by growth to fresh buds, and these, if vigorous, branch out and overtop on all sides many a feebler branch, so by generation I believe it has been with the great Tree of Life, which fills with its dead and broken branches the crust of the earth, and covers the surface with its ever branching and beautiful ramifications.


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 Rh praying for Miss Poole's perfect recovery, and we both remain, your affectionate,

34.

To.

2nd April 1804.

Mr. Flaxman advises that the drawing of Mr. Romney's which shall be chosen instead of "The Witch" (if that cannot be recovered), be "Hecate," the figure with the torch and snake, which he thinks one of the finest drawings. The twelve impressions of each of the plates which I now send ought to be unrolled immediately that you reteive them and put under somewhat to press them flat. You should have had fifteen of each, but I had not paper enough in proper order for printing. There is now in hand a new edition of Flaxman's Homer, with additional designs, two of which I am now engraving. I am uneasy at not hearing from Mr. Dally, to whom I enclosed £15 in a letter a fortnight ago, by his desire. I write to him by this post to inquire about it. Money in these times is not to be trifled with. I have now cleared the way to Romney, in whose service I now enter again with great pleasure, and hope soon to show you my zeal with good effect. Am in hopes that Miss


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 148 Poole is recovered, as you are silent on that most alarming and interesting topic in both your last letters. God be with you in all things. My wife joins me in this prayer.—I am, dear Sir, yours sincerely affectionate,

35.

To William Hayley.

7th April 1804.

,—You can have no idea, unless you were in London as I am, how much your name is loved and respected. I have the extreme pleasure of transmitting to you one proof of the respect, which you will be pleased with, and I hope will adopt and embrace. It comes through Mr. Hoare, from Mr. Phillips of St. Paul's Churchyard. It is, as yet, an entire secret between Mr. P[hillips], Mr. H[oare], and myself, and will remain so till you have given your decision. Mr. Phillips is a man of vast spirit and enterprise, with a solidity of character which few have; he is the man who applied to Cowper for that sonnet in favour of a prisoner at Leicester, which I believe you thought


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 Rh fit not to print; so you see he is spiritually adjoined to us. His connection throughout England, and indeed Europe and America, enable him to circulate publications to an immense extent, and he told Mr. Hoare that on the present work, which he proposes to commence with your assistance, he can afford to expend £2000 a year. Mr. Phillips considers you as the great leading character in literature, and his terms to others will amount to only one quarter of what he proposes to you. I send, enclosed, his terms, as Mr. Hoare, by my desire, has given them to me in writing. Knowing your aversion to reviews and reviewing, I consider the present proposal as peculiarly adapted to your ideas. It may be called a defence of literature against those pests of the press, and a bulwark for genius, which shall, with your good assistance, disperse those rebellious spirits of envy and malignity. In short, if you see it as I see it, you will embrace this proposal on the score of parental duty. Literature is your child. She calls for your assistance! You, who never refuse to assist any, how remote soever, will certainly hear her voice. Your answer to the proposal you will, if you think fit, direct to Mr. Hoare, who is worthy of every confidence you can place in him.—I am, dear Sir, your anxiously devoted,

.


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154 in 1759. He had just been captured at sea, and was coerced by threats of hanging into thus betraying his native Quebec, but coercion is a poor excuse for treason. He petitioned Pitt, moreover, for compensation or reward, and it is said with success. The son went to France about 1777, managed a manufactory for Philippe Egalité apparently at Montargis, joined the revolutionary clubs there, next went to Rouen, and then to Paris, where he stayed at the Hotel de Philadelphie, the resort of English and Americans, and sedulously attended the Jacobin Club. On the 16th December 1793 he was denounced at the Club as an agent of Pitt, and if his father's career was known this is not surprising. He was sharply interrogated, and sent to the Committee of Public Safety. As the Club usually sat till ten, Vitré doubtless passed that night in confinement, but the Committee probably discharged him. Anyhow, he is not on the guillotine list.

The British Catholic communities in France, twenty-eight in number, with about 1000 inmates and £15,000 revenue, were nearly all despoiled and broken up by the Revolution. The Embassy for a time, indeed, obtained their exemption from the law-suppressing monasteries, on the ground that their property was derived from British benefactions, and that to confiscate it, after the invitations and assurances given by French sovereigns to the


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 150 36.

To William Hayley.

27th April 1804.

—I have at length seen Mr. Hoare, after having repeatedly called on him every day and not finding him. I now understand that he received your reply to P[hillips']s proposal at Brighton, where he has a residence, from whence he sent it to London to Mr. Phillips; he has not seen P. since his return, and therefore cannot tell me how he understood your answer. Mr. H. appears to me to consider it as a rejection of the proposal altogether. I took the liberty to tell him that I could not consider it so, but that as I understood you, you had accepted the spirit of P's intention, which was to leave the whole conduct of the affair to you, and that you had accordingly nominated one of your friends and agreed to nominate others. But if P[hillips] meant that you should yourself take on you the drudgery of the ordinary business of a review, his proposal was by no means a generous one. Mr. H[oare] has promised to see Mr. Phillips immediately, and to know what his intentions are; but he says perhaps Mr. P. may not yet have seen your letter to him, and that his multiplicity of business may very well account for


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 Rh the delay. I have seen our excellent Flaxman lately. He is well in health, but has had such a burn on his hand as you had once, which has hindered his working for a fortnight; it is now better. He desires to be most affectionately remembered to you; he began a letter to you a week ago; perhaps by this time you have received it; but he is also a laborious votary of endless work. Engraving is of so slow process, I must beg of you to give me the earliest possible notice of what engraving is to be done for the Life of Romney. Endless work is the true title of engraving, as I find by the things I have in hand day and night. We feel much easier to hear that you have parted with your horse. Hope soon to hear that you have a living one of brass, a Pegasus of Corinthian metal; and that Miss Poole is again in such health as when she first mounted me on my beloved Bruno. I forgot to mention that Mr. Hoare desires his most respectful compliments to you. Speaks of taking a ride across the country to Felpham, as he always keeps a horse at Brighton. My wife joins me in love to you.—I remain, yours sincerely,


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Albemarle being made at Verulamium, in the time of the ninth abbot, in the latter part of the tenth century, an ancient book was discovered in a wall of the Roman city, bound in oak boards, and written in a language which none could read save an old priest named Unwon. He declared it to contain the story of Alban written in the British language. By the abbot's command the book was translated into Latin, and when the translation was finished the original volume crumbled away.

The cleric who was sheltered by Alban received the name Amphibalus, which first appears in the ‘Historia Britonum’ of Geoffrey of Monmouth [q. v.], and is evidently a confusion between the man and his cloak, for ‘amphibalus’ is equivalent to ‘caracalla,’ the word used in Bede's story. In 1178 a body asserted to be the remains of Amphibalus was found on Redbourn Green, near St. Albans, where it was believed that he was put to death after the martyrdom of his disciple. The body was laid in the abbey church, and, at the bidding of Abbot Symon, a monk of the house named William translated from English into Latin the story of Alban and his teacher in an elaborate form, supplying, as he says, the name Amphibalus from the ‘History’ of Geoffrey of Monmouth. The compiler of the ‘Chronica Majora’ took the legend from William's work. St. Alban of Britain has been confused with a St. Alban or Albinus of Mainz, said to have been martyred in the fifth century, and with a martyr Albinus, whose body was translated by the Empress Theophano to the church of St. Pantaleon at Cologne. At least three places in France bear the name St. Alban, a village near St. Brieuc (Côtes du Nord), a village near Roanne (Loire), and a small town near Mende (Lozère).

[Bede's Hist. Eccl. i. cc. 7, 18 (Plummer's Bede, 11, 17-20, 33); Constantius's Life of St. Germanus, 1, 25, ap. AA. SS. Bolland, Jul. 31, v. 202 sqq. 224, 250; Gildas, Hist. p. 17 (Engl. Hist. Soc.); Venantius Fortunatus, De Virginitate, Miscell. viii. 6 (Patrol. Lat. lxxxviii. 267); William of St. Albans and notes, ap. AA. SS. Bolland, Jun. 22, v. 126 sqq.; Matt. Paris's Chron. Maj. i. 149-52, 233, 331, 356-8, ii. 302; Gesta Abb. S. Alb. i. 12-18, 27, 70, 176, 192-3; Geoffrey of Monmouth's Hist. Brit. v. 5, ed. Giles; Usher's Antiq. pp. 76-89, 281; Bright's Early Engl. Church Hist. pp. 6, 7, ed. 1897.]  ALBEMARLE, [See, 1832–1894.]  ALBERT VICTOR CHRISTIAN EDWARD, and  (1864–1892), born at Frogmore, Buckinghamshire, on 8 Jan. 1864, was the eldest son of Albert Edward, prince of Wales (now Edward VII), and (Queen) Alexandra, eldest daughter of Christian IX, king of Denmark, Queen Victoria [q. v. Suppl.] was his grandmother, and Prince Albert Victor stood next to his father in the direct line of succession to the throne. He was baptised in Buckingham Palace chapel on 10 March following his birth, and was privately educated until 1877, when he was sent to join the training ship Britannia at Dartmouth. In 1879 he went with his brother Prince George (now Duke of Cornwall and York) on a three years' cruise in H.M.S. Bacchante, which sailed round the world and visited most of the British colonies. An account of the cruise, ‘compiled from the private journals, letters, and note-books’ of the young princes, was published in 1886 in two stout volumes by their tutor, the Rev. John N. (now Canon) Dalton. After some tuition in 1882-3 from James Kenneth Stephen [see under, ], Prince Albert Victor was in October 1883 entered at Trinity College, Cambridge ; during the long vacations he studied at Heidelberg, and in 1888 he was created hon. LL.D. of Cambridge. He was then sent to Aldershot, became lieutenant in the 10th hussars in 1886, major in 1889, and in 1889 captain in the 9th lancers, captain in the 3rd king's royal rifles, and aide-de-camp to the queen. In 1887 he visited Ireland, and in 1889-90 India (see, The Duke of Clarence in Southern India, London, 1891). On 24 May 1890 he was created Earl of Athlone and Duke of Clarence and Avondale. On 7 Dec. 1891 his betrothal was announced with his cousin, the Princess Mary of Teck (now the Duchess of Cornwall and York). The wedding was fixed for 27 Feb. 1892, but on 14 Jan. 1892 the duke died of pneumonia following influenza at Sandringham. He was buried in St. George's Chapel, Windsor, on 20 Jan. His place in the direct line of succession to the throne was taken by his brother George, then Duke of York. A portrait painted by J. Sant, R.A., in 1872, and another of him and Prince George as midshipmen, painted by C. Sohn, were exhibited in the Victorian Exhibition; other portraits are reproduced in Vincent's ‘Memoir.’ His death was the occasion of many laments in prose and verse, of which Tennyson's elegy, published in the ‘Nineteenth Century,’ February 1892, is the most notable. Lord Selborne wrote at the time, ‘I do not think there has been a more tragic event in our time, or one which is more likely to touch the hearts of the people


text: User:Hegurka

title: User:Hegurka


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User talk:169.151.1.35

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Page:Dictionary of National Biography. Sup. Vol I (1901).djvu/91

 generally’ (Memorials, ii. 373), On 18 Dec. 1892 King Edward VII, then Prince of Wales, laid the foundation-stone of the ‘Clarence Memorial Wing’ of St. Mary's Hospital, Paddington, which was designed to commemorate the duke's name.

 ALBERY, JAMES (1838–1889), dramatist, eldest son of James and Amelia Eleanor Albery, was born in Swan Street, Trinity Square, London, on 4 May 1838. After some private schooling he entered an architect's office in Fenchurch Street at fourteen, and remained there till, on the death of his father in 1859, he helped his mother in conducting the business of rope and twine dealer in the Blackfriars Road. But he had already formed the ambition of writing for the stage. After several unsuccessful endeavours, he, on 4 June 1866, gave to the Lyceum ‘Dr. Davy,’ an adaptation of ‘Le Docteur Robin,’ in which Mr. Herman Vezin played David Garrick. On 4 June 1870 Albery obtained at the Vaudeville his most conspicuous success in a three-act comedy called ‘Two Roses,’ in which (Sir) Henry Irving made a great reputation in the role of Digby Grant. This was strengthened by the addition (27 Aug.) of ‘Chiselling,’ a farce by Albery and Joseph J. Dalley. On the 250th representation of ‘Two Roses’ (the performance being for (Sir) Henry Irving's benefit), Albery delivered an original sketch, entitled ‘Our Secretary's Reply.’ ‘Two Roses’ was printed in Lacy's ‘Acting Plays,’ 1881.

At the St. James's, 4 March 1871, was produced Albery's ‘Two Thorns,’ which had already been played at the Prince of Wales's, Liverpool, as ‘Coquettes.’ On 27 May the Vaudeville produced his ‘Tweedie's Rights,’ a grim piece on the subject of delirium tremens, and on 9 Sept. his ‘Apple Blossoms.’ On 23 Oct., at the Lyceum, (Sir) Henry Irving appeared as Jingle in Albery's ‘Pickwick,’ a poor adaptation from Dickens. ‘Forgiven’ followed at the Globe (9 March 1872). ‘Oriana,’ a fairy legend, was given at the Globe on 15 Feb. 1873, and the ‘Will of Wise King Kino,’ a similar experiment, at the Princess's, 13 Sept. On 6 April 1874 ‘Wig and Gown’ was played at the Globe, and on the 22nd ‘Pride’ at the Vaudeville. ‘The Spendthrift’ followed at the Olympic, 24 May 1875; ‘The Man in Possession’ at the Gaiety, 4 Dec. 1876; and ‘Jingle,’ a revised version of his ‘Pickwick,’ at the Lyceum, 8 July 1878. With Mr. Joseph Hatton he produced at the Princess's, 30 Nov. 1878, ‘Number Twenty, or the Bastille of Calvados.’ To the Haymarket he gave ‘The Crisis’ (2 Dec. 1878), to the Prince of Wales's ‘Duty,’ from ‘Les Bourgeois de Pont-Arcy’ (27 Sept. 1879), and to the Vaudeville ‘Jacks and Jills’ (29 May 1880). To the Criterion Theatre he gave a series of successful adaptations, including ‘Pink Dominos’ (founded on the French of Hennequin and Delacour). Albery's work never fulfilled his promise, which at the outset was brilliant. He had a wild, extravagant imagination, and in ‘Oriana’ recalled the gifts of Fletcher. He was for a time a sort of stock writer to the Criterion. At that theatre his wife, Miss Mary Moore, whom he married in 1878 when she was very young, played female ‘lead.’ He died, while still comparatively young, in his chambers in St. Martin's Lane on 15 Aug. 1889, and was buried on 20 Aug. at Kensal Green.

 ALCOCK, RUTHERFORD (1809–1897), diplomatist in China and Japan, born in 1809, was the son of Thomas Alcock, a medical man practising at Ealing, and was himself educated for that profession. For a time he was house surgeon at Westminster Hospital, and in 1832 he was appointed surgeon to the British-Portuguese forces operating in Portugal. In 1836 he was transferred to the marine brigade engaged in the Carlist war in Spain, and so highly were his services valued that, though he remained only a year with his force, he became deputy inspector-general of hospitals. On his return to England he resumed medical work as lecturer in surgery at Sydenham College. But service abroad had fascinated him, and in 1844, in response to an application for service in China, he was nominated consul at Fuchow, one of the ports newly opened to trade by the treaty of 1842. On his way to his new post he was detained at Amoy, where, in the absence of the consul, his services were requisitioned. Here, with the assistance of Sir [q. v.], he did some excellent work by bringing home to the minds of the Chinese officials that treaties were solemn engagements, and not so many promises that were to be whittled away at the will of the mandarins. After a year and a half's residence at Fuchow he was transferred to Shanghai, whither Parkes followed him.

Alcock had not been long at his new post


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Albemarle, Earl of


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text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Albert Victor Christian Edward


text: Dictionary of National Biography, 1901 supplement/Albery, James


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 152 37.

To.

4th May 1804.

,—I thank you sincerely for Falconer, an admirable poet, and the admirable prints to it by Fittler. Whether you intended it or not, they have given me some excellent hints in engraving; his manner of working is what I shall endeavour to adopt in many points. I have seen the elder Mr. Walker. He knew and admired without any preface my print of Romney, and when his daughter came in he gave the print into her hand without a word, and she immediately said, "Ah! Romney! younger than I knew him, but very like indeed." Mr. Walker showed me Romney's first attempt at oil painting; it is a copy from a Dutch picture—"Dutch Boor Smoking"; on the back is written, "This was the first attempt at oil painting by G. Romney." He shewed me also the last performance of Romney. It is of Mr. Walker and family, the draperies put


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 Rh in by somebody else. It is a very excellent picture, but unfinished. The figures as large as life, half length; Mr. W., three sons, and, I believe, two daughters, with maps, instruments, etc. Mr. Walker also showed me a portrait of himself (W.), whole length, on a canvas about two feet by one and a half; it is the first portrait Romney ever painted. But above all, a picture of "Lear and Cordelia," when he awakes and knows her,—an incomparable production, which Mr. W. bought for five shillings at a broker's shop. It is about five feet by four, and exquisite for expression; indeed, it is most pathetic. The heads of Lear and Cordelia can never be surpassed, and Kent and the other attendant are admirable. The picture is very highly finished. Other things I saw of Romney's first works: two copies, perhaps from Borgognone, of battles; and Mr. Walker promises to collect all he can of information for you. I much admired his mild and gentle benevolent manners; it seems as if all Romney's intimate friends were truly amiable and feeling like himself.

I have also seen Alderman Boydell, who has


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 154 promised to get the number and prices of all Romney s prints as you desired. He has sent a catalogue of all his collection, and a scheme of his lottery. Desires his compliments to you; says he laments your absence from London, as your advice would be acceptable at all times, but especially at the present. He is very thin and decayed, and but the shadow of what he was; so he is now a shadow s shadow;—but how can we expect a very stout man at eighty-five, which age he tells me he has now reached? You would have been pleased to see his eyes light up at the mention of your name.

Mr. Flaxman agrees with me that somewhat more than outline is necessary to the execution of Romney's designs, because his merit is eminent in the art of massing his lights and shades. I should propose to etch them in a rapid but firm manner, somewhat, perhaps, as I did the "Head of Euler"; the price I receive for engraving Flaxman's outlines of Homer is five guineas each. I send the "Domenichino," which is very neatly done. His merit was but little in light and shade; outline was his element, and yet these outlines give but a faint idea of the finished prints from his works, several of the best of which I have. I send also the French Monuments, and inclose with them a Catalogue of Bell's Gallery, and another of the


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28 loosened from the brush, a tooth of the comb crashed down to the wide bay, to the open sea, to be rocked by the wind, to be drifted by the waves. A wind rocked it, a wave drifted it ashore. Hence the autumn ‘worm’ originated, the winter snake obtained its habits [v. origin], that crawls about in a cowhouse, moves quietly about under its corners.

(c.)

Moon’s daughter (Kuutar) was bewailing her gold, Sun’s daughter (Päivätär) her silver. A tear trickled from her eyes, a water-drop rolled down suddenly to her lovely face, from her lovely face to her swelling breast, and thence it rolled down into a dell. From it a lovely oak sprang up, a green shoot shot upwards.

A little man emerged from the sea, raised himself by degrees from the waves. He was scarcely a quarter-ell tall, his height was a woman’s span, in his hand was a tiny axe with an ornamented haft. He, indeed, knew how to fell the oak, to cut down the splendid tree. A chip of it that flew off disappeared in the sea, the water bleached it into foam, a wave drifted it ashore.

A furious old woman [v. a harlot, the mistress of Pohjola] was bucking clothes, dabbling at her linen rags, picked it up, poked it into her long-thonged wallet, and carried it home to the farmyard to make it into snails, to form it into grubs.

She upset the foam from her wallet, flung it near a cattleshed, among the litter of the byre, hides it in the sweepings of the yard, covered it with the rubbish of the farm. From that the family was bred, the small white snake (worm) grew up, that utters indistinct sounds in a cowhouse, mumbles in the muck, crawls over a milk-bowl, wriggles over the handle of a milk-pail.

(d.)

A wolf was running along the ice, a pike was swimming under the ice, slaver from the wolfs mouth dripped down


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 Rh Exhibition, which I have not yet seen. I mentioned the pictures from Sterne to Mr. Walker. He says that there were several; one, a garden scene, with Uncle Toby and Obadiah planting in the garden; but that of "Le Fevre's Death" he speaks of as incomparable, but cannot tell where it now is, as they were scattered abroad, being disposed of by means of a raffle. He supposes it is in Westmoreland; promises to make every inquiry about it. Accept, also, of my thanks for Cowper's third volume, which I got, as you directed, of Mr. Johnson. I have seen Mr. Rose; he looks, though not so well as I have seen him, yet tolerably, considering the terrible storm he has been through! He says that the last session was a severe labour; indeed it must be so to a man just out of so dreadful a fever. I also thank you for your very beautiful little poem on the king's recovery; it is one of the prettiest things I ever read, and I hope the king will live to fulfil the prophecy and die in peace: but at present, poor man, I understand he is poorly indeed, and times threaten worse than ever. I must now express my sorrow and my hopes for our good Miss Poole, and so take my leave for the present, with the joint love of my good woman,


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Rh to the bones of the dark grey pike. A wind wafted it to land, a current jolted it, a wave drifted it ashore as foam into a hole in a stone.

Ahimo’s girl, Annikki, ever engaged at bucking clothes, gathered it into her wallet and carried it into the pen in the cowhouse. Hence that birth took place, that evil thing originated, the tiny white wriggling snow-coloured ‘worm’.

(e.)

A harlot, the mistress of Pohjola, was combing her head, brushing her hair. A hair-plait fell from her head down to the open sea, the wide and open main. A wind wafted it to land, a tempest bore it to a rock.

Hiisi’s little serving-girl, a woman of blonde complexion, takes a good look at it, turns it over, and speaks in the following terms: “A harlot, the mistress of Pohjola, has cast it from her bosom, has flung some of her wool this way, has torn off some hair upon the waters which a wind has drifted to land, a tempest has carried to a rock. What now might be made of it, what be fashioned out of the shameful woman’s hair, out of the hair-plait of the village harlot?”

A wretch was sitting on the threshold, a lubber in the centre of the floor, a lout at the far end of the room turned sharply round. They sat with their breasts towards the east, they remain with their heads towards the south. The wretch upon the threshold, the lubber in the centre of the floor, the lout at the end of the room said: “From these might come grubs, earth-worms might generate.”

The girls spin out snakes, reeled up earth-worms; the whorl rotated steadily, the spindle whirled rapidly while they were producing earth-worms, were spinning out snakes.

That was the origin of the stall [v. winter] grub, the first appearance of the evil brood. It was engendered in a pig-sty, reared in a sheep-pen on an autumnal dust-heap, on the hard ground of winter-time. This was its first


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290


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Rh

hitherto sometimes spoken as if the variations—so common and multiform in organic beings under domestication, and in a lesser degree in those in a state of nature—had been due to chance. This, of course, is a wholly incorrect expression, but it serves to acknowledge plainly our ignorance of the cause of each particular variation. Some authors believe it to be as much the function of the reproductive system to produce individual differences, or very slight deviations of structure, as to make the child like its parents. But the much greater variability, as well as the greater frequency of monstrosities, under domestication or cultivation, than under nature, leads me to believe that deviations of structure are in some way due to the nature of the conditions of life, to which the parents and their more remote ancestors have been exposed during several generations. I have remarked in the first chapter—but a long catalogue of facts which cannot be here given would be necessary to show the truth of the remark—that the reproductive system is eminently susceptible to changes in the conditions of life; and to


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132 this system being functionally disturbed in the parents, I chiefly attribute the varying or plastic condition of the offspring. The male and female sexual elements seem to be affected before that union takes place which is to form a new being. In the case of "sporting" plants, the bud, which in its earliest condition does not apparently differ essentially from an ovule, is alone affected. But why, because the reproductive system is disturbed, this or that part should vary more or less, we are profoundly ignorant. Nevertheless, we can here and there dimly catch a faint ray of light, and we may feel sure that there must be some cause for each deviation of structure, however slight.

How much direct effect difference of climate, food, &c., produces on any being is extremely doubtful. My impression is, that the effect is extremely small in the case of animals, but perhaps rather more in that of plants. We may, at least, safely conclude that such influences cannot have produced the many striking and complex co-adaptations of structure between one organic being and another, which we see everywhere throughout nature. Some little influence may be attributed to climate, food, &c.: thus, E. Forbes speaks confidently that shells at their southern limit, and when living in shallow water, are more brightly coloured than those of the same species further north or from greater depths. Gould believes that birds of the same species are more brightly coloured under a clear atmosphere, than when living on islands or near the coast. So with insects, Wollaston is convinced that residence near the sea affects their colours. Moquin-Tandon gives a list of plants which when growing near the sea-shore have their leaves in some degree fleshy, though not elsewhere fleshy. Several other such cases could be given.

The fact of varieties of one species, when they range


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Rh into the zone of habitation of other species, often acquiring in a very slight degree some of the characters of such species, accords with our view that species of all kinds are only well-marked and permanent varieties. Thus the species of shells which are confined to tropical and shallow seas are generally brighter-coloured than those confined to cold and deeper seas. The birds which are confined to continents are, according to Mr. Gould, brighter-coloured than those of islands. The insect-species confined to sea-coasts, as every collector knows, are often brassy or lurid. Plants which live exclusively on the sea-side are very apt to have fleshy leaves. He who believes in the creation of each species, will have to say that this shell, for instance, was created with bright colours for a warm sea; but that this other shell became bright-coloured by variation when it ranged into warmer or shallower waters.

When a variation is of the slightest use to a being, we cannot tell how much of it to attribute to the accumulative action of natural selection, and how much to the conditions of life. Thus, it is well known to furriers that animals of the same species have thicker and better fur the more severe the climate is under which they have lived; but who can tell how much of this difference may be due to the warmest-clad individuals having been favoured and preserved during many generations, and how much to the direct action of the severe climate? for it would appear that climate has some direct action on the hair of our domestic quadrupeds.

Instances could be given of the same variety being produced under conditions of life as different as can well be conceived; and, on the other hand, of different varieties being produced from the same species under the same conditions. Such facts show how indirectly


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134 the conditions of life must act. Again, innumerable instances are known to every naturalist of species keeping true, or not varying at all, although living under the most opposite climates. Such considerations as these incline me to lay very little weight on the direct action of the conditions of life. Indirectly, as already remarked, they seem to play an important part in affecting the reproductive system, and in thus inducing variability; and natural selection will then accumulate all profitable variations, however slight, until they become plainly developed and appreciable by us.

Effects of Use and Disuse.—From the facts alluded to in the first chapter, I think there can be little doubt that use in our domestic animals strengthens and enlarges certain parts, and disuse diminishes them; and that such modifications are inherited. Under free nature, we can have no standard of comparison, by which to judge of the effects of long-continued use or disuse, for we know not the parent-forms; but many animals have structures which can be explained by the effects of disuse. As Professor Owen has remarked, there is no greater anomaly in nature than a bird that cannot fly; yet there are several in this state. The logger-headed duck of South America can only flap along the surface of the water, and has its wings in nearly the same condition as the domestic Aylesbury duck. As the larger ground-feeding birds seldom take flight except to escape danger, I believe that the nearly wingless condition of several birds, which now inhabit or have lately inhabited several oceanic islands, tenanted by no beast of prey, has been caused by disuse. The ostrich indeed inhabits continents and is exposed to danger from which it cannot escape by flight, but by kicking it can defend itself from enemies, as well as any of the smaller


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Rh quadrupeds. We may imagine that the early progenitor of the ostrich had habits like those of a bustard, and that as natural selection increased in successive generations the size and weight of its body, its legs were used more, and its wings less, until they became incapable of flight.

Kirby has remarked (and I have observed the same fact) that the anterior tarsi, or feet, of many male dung-feeding beetles are very often broken off; he examined seventeen specimens in his own collection, and not one had even a relic left. In the Onites apelles the tarsi are so habitually lost, that the insect has been described as not having them. In some other genera they are present, but in a rudimentary condition. In the Ateuchus or sacred beetle of the Egyptians, they are totally deficient. There is not sufficient evidence to induce us to believe that mutilations are ever inherited; and I should prefer explaining the entire absence of the anterior tarsi in Ateuchus, and their rudimentary condition in some other genera, by the long-continued effects of disuse in their progenitors; for as the tarsi are almost always lost in many dung-feeding beetles, they must be lost early in life, and therefore cannot be much used by these insects.

In some cases we might easily put down to disuse modifications of structure which are wholly, or mainly, due to natural selection. Mr. Wollaston has discovered the remarkable fact that 200 beetles, out of the 550 species inhabiting Madeira, are so far deficient in wings that they cannot fly; and that of the twenty-nine endemic genera, no less than twenty-three genera have all their species in this condition! Several facts, namely, that beetles in many parts of the world are very frequently blown to sea and perish; that the beetles in Madeira, as observed by Mr. Wollaston, lie much


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136, until the wind lulls and the sun shines; that the proportion of wingless beetles is larger on the exposed Dezertas than in Madeira itself; and especially the extraordinary fact, so strongly insisted on by Mr. Wollaston, of the almost entire absence of certain large groups of beetles, elsewhere excessively numerous, and which groups have habits of life almost necessitating frequent flight;—these several considerations have made me believe that the wingless condition of so many Madeira beetles is mainly due to the action of natural selection, but combined probably with disuse. For during thousands of successive generations each individual beetle which flew least, either from its wings having been ever so little less perfectly developed or from indolent habit, will have had the best chance of surviving from not being blown out to sea; and, on the other hand, those beetles which most readily took to flight will oftenest have been blown to sea and thus have been destroyed.

The insects in Madeira which are not ground-feeders, and which, as the flower-feeding coleoptera and lepidoptera, must habitually use their wings to gain their subsistence, have, as Mr. Wollaston suspects, their wings not at all reduced, but even enlarged. This is quite compatible with the action of natural selection. For when a new insect first arrived on the island, the tendency of natural selection to enlarge or to reduce the wings, would depend on whether a greater number of individuals were saved by successfully battling with the winds, or by giving up the attempt and rarely or never flying. As with mariners shipwrecked near a coast, it would have been better for the good swimmers if they had been able to swim still further, whereas it would have been better for the bad swimmers if they had not been able to swim at all and had stuck to the wreck.


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Rh The eyes of moles and of some burrowing rodents are rudimentary in size, and in some cases are quite covered up by skin and fur. This state of the eyes is probably due to gradual reduction from disuse, but aided perhaps by natural selection. In South America, a burrowing rodent, the tuco-tuco, or Ctenomys, is even more subterranean in its habits than the mole; and I was assured by a Spaniard, who had often caught them, that they were frequently blind; one which I kept alive was certainly in this condition, the cause, as appeared on dissection, having been inflammation of the nictitating membrane. As frequent inflammation of the eyes must be injurious to any animal, and as eyes are certainly not indispensable to animals with subterranean habits, a reduction in their size with the adhesion of the eyelids and growth of fur over them, might in such case be an advantage; and if so, natural selection would constantly aid the effects of disuse.

It is well known that several animals, belonging to the most different classes, which inhabit the caves of Styria and of Kentucky, are blind. In some of the crabs the foot-stalk for the eye remains, though the eye is gone; the stand for the telescope is there, though the telescope with its glasses has been lost. As it is difficult to imagine that eyes, though useless, could be in any way injurious to animals living in darkness, I attribute their loss wholly to disuse. In one of the blind animals, namely, the cave-rat, the eyes are of immense size; and Professor Silliman thought that it regained, after living some days in the light, some slight power of vision. In the same manner as in Madeira the wings of some of the insects have been enlarged, and the wings of others have been reduced by natural selection aided by use and disuse, so in the case of the cave-rat natural selection seems to have struggled with the loss of light and


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 156 who is still stiff-kneed but well in other respects. —I am, dear Sir, yours most sincerely,

.

38.

To William Hayley.

28th May 1804.

,—I thank you heartily for your kind offer of reading, etc.; I have read the book through attentively and was much entertained and instructed, but have not yet come to the Life of Washington, I suppose an American would tell me that Washington did all that was done before he was born, as the French now adore Bonaparte and the English our poor George; so the Americans will consider Washington as their god. This is only Grecian, or rather Trojan, worship, and perhaps will be revised in an age or two. In the meantime I have the happiness of seeing the Divine countenance in such men as Cowper and Milton more distinctly than in any prince or hero. Mr. Phillips has sent a small poem; he would not tell the author's name, but desired me to inclose it for you with Washington's Life.

Mr. Carr called on me, and I, as you desired,


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138 to have increased the size of the eyes; whereas with all the other inhabitants of the caves, disuse by itself seems to have done its work.

It is difficult to imagine conditions of life more similar than deep limestone caverns under a nearly similar climate; so that on the common view of the blind animals having been separately created for the American and European caverns, close similarity in their organisation and affinities might have been expected; but, as Schiödte and others have remarked, this is not the case, and the cave-insects of the two continents are not more closely allied than might have been anticipated from the general resemblance of the other inhabitants of North America and Europe. On my view we must suppose that American animals, having ordinary powers of vision, slowly migrated by successive generations from the outer world into the deeper and deeper recesses of the Kentucky caves, as did European animals into the caves of Europe. We have some evidence of this gradation of habit; for, as Schiödte remarks, "animals not far remote from ordinary forms, prepare the transition from light to darkness. Next follow those that are constructed for twilight; and, last of all, those destined for total darkness." By the time that an animal had reached, after numberless generations, the deepest recesses, disuse will on this view have more or less perfectly obliterated its eyes, and natural selection will often have effected other changes, such as an increase in the length of the antennæ or palpi, as a compensation for blindness. Notwithstanding such modifications, we might expect still to see in the cave-animals of America, affinities to the other inhabitants of that continent, and in those of Europe, to the inhabitants of the European continent. And this is the case with some of the American cave-animals, as I hear from


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Rh Professor Dana; and some of the European cave-insects are very closely allied to those of the surrounding country. It would be most difficult to give any rational explanation of the affinities of the blind cave-animals to the other inhabitants of the two continents on the ordinary view of their independent creation. That several of the inhabitants of the caves of the Old and New Worlds should be closely related, we might expect from the well-known relationship of most of their other productions. Far from feeling any surprise that some of the cave-animals should be very anomalous, as Agassiz has remarked in regard to the blind fish, the Amblyopsis, and as is the case with the blind Proteus with reference to the reptiles of Europe, I am only surprised that more wrecks of ancient life have not been preserved, owing to the less severe competition to which the inhabitants of these dark abodes will probably have been exposed.

Acclimatisation.—Habit is hereditary with plants, as in the period of flowering, in the amount of rain requisite for seeds to germinate, in the time of sleep, &c., and this leads me to say a few words on acclimatisation. As it is extremely common for species of the same genus to inhabit very hot and very cold countries, and as I believe that all the species of the same genus have descended from a single parent, if this view be correct, acclimatisation must be readily effected during long-continued descent. It is notorious that each species is adapted to the climate of its own home: species from an arctic or even from a temperate region cannot endure a tropical climate, or conversely. So again, many succulent plants cannot endure a damp climate. But the degree of adaptation of species to the climates under which they live is often overrated.


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30 performance, which it attempted in a hurry. It bit Christ’s horse, killed the Almighty’s foal right through the floor of a bony stall, through a copper-bottomed manger.

(f.) Even old Väinämöinen [v. Kullervo], the old son of Kaleva, when he went to wage war formerly, used to sharpen his spears, used to feather his arrows near women in a cattle-shed. His spear was sharpened to a point, his arrows were feathered. He brandished his spear and threw it at a clay-bottomed field. The spear broke in two, the ‘borer’ fell upon the field, a tin nail fell suddenly, a copper ring slipped off and plumped into the muck, into the litter of a shed. From that, then, a cunning one was born, a ‘nimble bird’ was bred, the very best snow-coloured gliding animal grew up.

XLII.—.

(a.) The Old man (Ukko) of the air struck fire, produced a sudden flash with his fiery-pointed sword, his scintillating blade, in the sky above, behind the starry firmament [v. in its third story]. With the blow he obtained fire, conceals the spark in a golden bag, in a silver box, and gave it to be rocked by a girl, swung to-and-fro by an air-maiden. A girl upon a long cloud, an air-maiden on the margin of the air, rocks the fire in a golden cradle suspended by silver thongs. The silver thongs creaked as they swang, the golden cradle rattled, the clouds moved, the sky squeaked, the vaults of the sky listed to one side while fire was being rocked, while the flame was being swung.


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140 We may infer this from our frequent inability to predict whether or not an imported plant will endure our climate, and from the number of plants and animals brought from warmer countries which here enjoy good health. We have reason to believe that species in a state of nature are limited in their ranges by the competition of other organic beings quite as much as, or more than, by adaptation to particular climates. But whether or not the adaptation be generally very close, we have evidence, in the case of some few plants, of their becoming, to a certain extent, naturally habituated to different temperatures, or becoming acclimatised: thus the pines and rhododendrons, raised from seed collected by Dr. Hooker from trees growing at different heights on the Himalaya, were found in this country to possess different constitutional powers of resisting cold. Mr. Thwaites informs me that he has observed similar facts in Ceylon, and analogous observations have been made by Mr. H. C. Watson on European species of plants brought from the Azores to England. In regard to animals, several authentic cases could be given of species within historical times having largely extended their range from warmer to cooler latitudes, and conversely; but we do not positively know that these animals were strictly adapted to their native climate, but in all ordinary cases we assume such to be the case; nor do we know that they have subsequently become acclimatised to their new homes.

As I believe that our domestic animals were originally chosen by uncivilised man because they were useful and bred readily under confinement, and not because they were subsequently found capable of far-extended transportation, I think the common and extraordinary capacity in our domestic animals of not only withstanding the most different climates but of being perfectly


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Rh fertile (a far severer test) under them, may be used as an argument that a large proportion of other animals, now in a state of nature, could easily be brought to bear widely different climates. We must not, however, push the foregoing argument too far, on account of the probable origin of some of our domestic animals from several wild stocks: the blood, for instance, of a tropical and arctic wolf or wild dog may perhaps be mingled in our domestic breeds. The rat and mouse cannot be considered as domestic animals, but they have been transported by man to many parts of the world, and now have a far wider range than any other rodent, living free under the cold climate of Faroe in the north and of the Falklands in the south, and on many islands in the torrid zones. Hence I am inclined to look at adaptation to any special climate as a quality readily grafted on an innate wide flexibility of constitution, which is common to most animals. On this view, the capacity of enduring the most different climates by man himself and by his domestic animals, and such facts as that former species of the elephant and rhinoceros were capable of enduring a glacial climate, whereas the living species are now all tropical or sub-tropical in their habits, ought not to be looked at as anomalies, but merely as examples of a very common flexibility of constitution, brought, under peculiar circumstances, into play.

How much of the acclimatisation of species to any peculiar climate is due to mere habit, and how much to the natural selection of varieties having different innate constitutions, and how much to both means combined, is a very obscure question. That habit or custom has some influence I must believe, both from analogy, and from the incessant advice given in agricultural works, even in the ancient Encyclopædias of China, to be very


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142 in transposing animals from one district to another; for it is not likely that man should have succeeded in selecting so many breeds and sub-breeds with constitutions specially fitted for their own districts: the result must, I think, be due to habit. On the other hand, I can see no reason to doubt that natural selection will continually tend to preserve those individuals which are born with constitutions best adapted to their native countries. In treatises on many kinds of cultivated plants, certain varieties are said to withstand certain climates better than others: this is very strikingly shown in works on fruit trees published in the United States, in which certain varieties are habitually recommended for the northern, and others for the southern States; and as most of these varieties are of recent origin, they cannot owe their constitutional differences to habit. The case of the Jerusalem artichoke, which is never propagated by seed, and of which consequently new varieties have not been produced, has even been advanced—for it is now as tender as ever it was—as proving that acclimatisation cannot be effected! The case, also, of the kidney-bean has been often cited for a similar purpose, and with much greater weight; but until some one will sow, during a score of generations, his kidney-beans so early that a very large proportion are destroyed by frost, and then collect seed from the few survivors, with care to prevent accidental crosses, and then again get seed from these seedlings, with the same precautions, the experiment cannot be said to have been even tried. Nor let it be supposed that no differences in the constitution of seedling kidney-beans ever appear, for an account has been published how much more hardy some seedlings appeared to be than others.

On the whole, I think we may conclude that habit,


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Rh use, and disuse, have, in some cases, played a considerable part in the modification of the constitution, and of the structure of various organs; but that the effects of use and disuse have often been largely combined with, and sometimes overmastered by, the natural selection of innate differences.

Correlation of Growth.—I mean by this expression that the whole organisation is so tied together during its growth and development, that when slight variations in any one part occur, and are accumulated through natural selection, other parts become modified. This is a very important subject, most imperfectly understood. The most obvious case is, that modifications accumulated solely for the good of the young or larva, will, it may safely be concluded, affect the structure of the adult; in the same manner as any malconformation affecting the early embryo, seriously affects the whole organisation of the adult. The several parts of the body which are homologous, and which, at an early embryonic period, are alike, seem liable to vary in an allied manner: we see this in the right and left sides of the body varying in the same manner; in the front and hind legs, and even in the jaws and limbs, varying together, for the lower jaw is believed to be homologous with the limbs. These tendencies, I do not doubt, may be mastered more or less completely by natural selection: thus a family of stags once existed with an antler only on one side; and if this had been of any great use to the breed it might probably have been rendered permanent by natural selection.

Homologous parts, as has been remarked by some authors, tend to cohere; this is often seen in monstrous plants; and nothing is more common than the union of homologous parts in normal structures, as the union of


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144 the petals of the corolla into a tube. Hard parts seem to affect the form of adjoining soft parts; it is believed by some authors that the diversity in the shape of the pelvis in birds causes the remarkable diversity in the shape of their kidneys. Others believe that the shape of the pelvis in the human mother influences by pressure the shape of the head of the child. In snakes, according to Schlegel, the shape of the body and the manner of swallowing determine the position of several of the most important viscera.

The nature of the bond of correlation is very frequently quite obscure. M. Is. Geoffroy St. Hilaire has forcibly remarked, that certain malconformations very frequently, and that others rarely coexist, without our being able to assign any reason. What can be more singular than the relation between blue eyes and deafness in cats, and the tortoise-shell colour with the female sex; the feathered feet and skin between the outer toes in pigeons, and the presence of more or less down on the young birds when first hatched, with the future colour of their plumage; or, again, the relation between the hair and teeth in the naked Turkish dog, though here probably homology comes into play? With respect to this latter case of correlation, I think it can hardly be accidental, that if we pick out the two orders of mammalia which are most abnormal in their dermal covering, viz. Cetacea (whales) and Edentata (armadilloes, scaly ant-eaters, &c.), that these are likewise the most abnormal in their teeth.

I know of no case better adapted to show the importance of the laws of correlation in modifying important structures, independently of utility and, therefore, of natural selection, than that of the difference between the outer and inner flowers in some Compositous and Umbelliferous plants. Every one knows the


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Rh difference in the ray and central florets of, for instance, the daisy, and this difference is often accompanied with the abortion of parts of the flower. But, in some Compositous plants, the seeds also differ in shape and sculpture; and even the ovary itself, with its accessory parts, differs, as has been described by Cassini. These differences have been attributed by some authors to pressure, and the shape of the seeds in the ray-florets in some Compositæ countenances this idea; but, in the case of the corolla of the Umbelliferæ, it is by no means, as Dr. Hooker informs me, in species with the densest heads that the inner and outer flowers most frequently differ. It might have been thought that the development of the ray-petals by drawing nourishment from certain other parts of the flower had caused their abortion; but in some Compositæ there is a difference in the seeds of the outer and inner florets without any difference in the corolla. Possibly, these several differences may be connected with some difference in the flow of nutriment towards the central and external flowers: we know, at least, that in irregular flowers, those nearest to the axis are oftenest subject to peloria, and become regular. I may add, as an instance of this, and of a striking case of correlation, that I have recently observed in some garden pelargoniums, that the central flower of the truss often loses the patches of darker colour in the two upper petals; and that when this occurs, the adherent nectary is quite aborted; when the colour is absent from only one of the two upper petals, the nectary is only much shortened.

With respect to the difference in the corolla of the central and exterior flowers of a head or umbel, I do not feel at all sure that C. C. Sprengel's idea that the ray-florets serve to attract insects, whose agency is highly advantageous in the fertilisation of plants of


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146 these two orders, is so far-fetched, as it may at first appear: and if it be advantageous, natural selection may have come into play. But in regard to the differences both in the internal and external structure of the seeds, which are not always correlated with any differences in the flowers, it seems impossible that they can be in any way advantageous to the plant: yet in the Umbelliferæ these differences are of such apparent importance—the seeds being in some cases, according to Tausch, orthospermous in the exterior flowers and cœlospermous in the central flowers,—that the elder De Candolle founded his main divisions of the order on analogous differences. Hence we see that modifications of structure, viewed by systematists as of high value, may be wholly due to unknown laws of correlated growth, and without being, as far as we can see, of the slightest service to the species.

We may often falsely attribute to correlation of growth, structures which are common to whole groups of species, and which in truth are simply due to inheritance; for an ancient progenitor may have acquired through natural selection some one modification in structure, and, after thousands of generations, some other and independent modification; and these two modifications, having been transmitted to a whole group of descendants with diverse habits, would naturally be thought to be correlated in some necessary manner. So, again, I do not doubt that some apparent correlations, occurring throughout whole orders, are entirely due to the manner alone in which natural selection can act. For instance, Alph. De Candolle has remarked that winged seeds are never found in fruits which do not open: I should explain the rule by the fact that seeds could not gradually become winged through natural selection, except in fruits which opened; so that the individual plants producing


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Rh seeds which were a little better fitted to be wafted further, might get an advantage over those producing seed less fitted for dispersal; and this process could not possibly go on in fruit which did not open.

The elder Geoffroy and Goethe propounded, at about the same period, their law of compensation or balancement of growth; or, as Goethe expressed it, "in order to spend on one side, nature is forced to economise on the other side." I think this holds true to a certain extent with our domestic productions: if nourishment flows to one part or organ in excess, it rarely flows, at least in excess, to another part; thus it is difficult to get a cow to give much milk and to fatten readily. The same varieties of the cabbage do not yield abundant and nutritious foliage and a copious supply of oil-bearing seeds. When the seeds in our fruits become atrophied, the fruit itself gains largely in size and quality. In our poultry, a large tuft of feathers on the head is generally accompanied by a diminished comb, and a large beard by diminished wattles. With species in a state of nature it can hardly be maintained that the law is of universal application; but many good observers, more especially botanists, believe in its truth. I will not, however, here give any instances, for I see hardly any way of distinguishing between the effects, on the one hand, of a part being largely developed through natural selection and another and adjoining part being reduced by this same process or by disuse, and, on the other hand, the actual withdrawal of nutriment from one part owing to the excess of growth in another and adjoining part.

I suspect, also, that some of the cases of compensation which have been advanced, and likewise some other facts, may be merged under a more general principle, namely, that natural selection is continually trying to economise in every part of the organisation. If under


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148 changed conditions of life a structure before useful becomes less useful, any diminution, however slight, in its development, will be seized on by natural selection, for it will profit the individual not to have its nutriment wasted in building up an useless structure. I can thus only understand a fact with which I was much struck when examining cirripedes, and of which many other instances could be given: namely, that when a cirripede is parasitic within another and is thus protected, it loses more or less completely its own shell or carapace. This is the case with the male Ibla, and in a truly extraordinary manner with the Proteolepas: for the carapace in all other cirripedes consists of the three highly-important anterior segments of the head enormously developed, and furnished with great nerves and muscles; but in the parasitic and protected Proteolepas, the whole anterior part of the head is reduced to the merest rudiment attached to the bases of the prehensile antennæ. Now the saving of a large and complex structure, when rendered superfluous by the parasitic habits of the Proteolepas, though effected by slow steps, would be a decided advantage to each successive individual of the species; for in the struggle for life to which every animal is exposed, each individual Proteolepas would have a better chance of supporting itself, by less nutriment being wasted in developing a structure now become useless.

Thus, as I believe, natural selection will always succeed in the long run in reducing and saving every part of the organisation, as soon as it is rendered superfluous, without by any means causing some other part to be largely developed in a corresponding degree. And, conversely, that natural selection may perfectly well succeed in largely developing any organ, without requiring as a necessary compensation the reduction of some adjoining part.


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Rh It seems to be a rule, as remarked by Is. Geoffroy St. Hilaire, both in varieties and in species, that when any part or organ is repeated many times in the structure of the same individual (as the vertebræ in snakes, and the stamens in polyandrous flowers) the number is variable; whereas the number of the same part or organ, when it occurs in lesser numbers, is constant. The same author and some botanists have further remarked that multiple parts are also very liable to variation in structure. Inasmuch as this "vegetative repetition," to use Prof. Owen's expression, seems to be a sign of low organisation; the foregoing remark seems connected with the very general opinion of naturalists, that beings low in the scale of nature are more variable than those which are higher. I presume that lowness in this case means that the several parts of the organisation have been but little specialised for particular functions; and as long as the same part has to perform diversified work, we can perhaps see why it should remain variable, that is, why natural selection should have preserved or rejected each little deviation of form less carefully than when the part has to serve for one special purpose alone. In the same way that a knife which has to cut all sorts of things may be of almost any shape; whilst a tool for some particular object had better be of some particular shape. Natural selection, it should never be forgotten, can act on each part of each being, solely through and for its advantage.

Rudimentary parts, it has been stated by some authors, and I believe with truth, are apt to be highly variable. We shall have to recur to the general subject of rudimentary and aborted organs; and I will here only add that their variability seems to be owing to their uselessness, and therefore to natural selection having no power to check deviations in their structure. Thus


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150 rudimentary parts are left to the free play of the various laws of growth, to the effects of long-continued disuse, and to the tendency to reversion.

A part developed in any species in an extraordinary degree or manner, in comparison with the same part in allied species, tends to be highly variable.—Several years ago I was much struck with a remark, nearly to the above effect, published by Mr. Waterhouse. I infer also from an observation made by Professor Owen, with respect to the length of the arms of the ourang-outang, that he has come to a nearly similar conclusion. It is hopeless to attempt to convince any one of the truth of this proposition without giving the long array of facts which I have collected, and which cannot possibly be here introduced. I can only state my conviction that it is a rule of high generality. I am aware of several causes of error, but I hope that I have made due allowance for them. It should be understood that the rule by no means applies to any part, however unusually developed, unless it be unusually developed in comparison with the same part in closely allied species. Thus, the bat's wing is a most abnormal structure in the class mammalia; but the rule would not here apply, because there is a whole group of bats having wings; it would apply only if some one species of bat had its wings developed in some remarkable manner in comparison with the other species of the same genus. The rule applies very strongly in the case of secondary sexual characters, when displayed in any unusual manner. The term, secondary sexual characters, used by Hunter, applies to characters which are attached to one sex, but are not directly connected with the act of reproduction. The rule applies to males and females; but as females more rarely offer remarkable secondary sexual characters, it applies