l86l.] HENSLOW'S DEATH DESIGN. 373 



give my thoughts as they arose, for you or Jenyns to use as 

 you think fit. 



" You will see that I have exceeded your request, but, as I 

 said when I began, I took pleasure in writing my impression 

 of his admirable character."] 



C. Darwin to Asa Gray. 



Down, June 5 [1861]. 



My DEAR GRAY, I have been rather extra busy, so have 

 been slack in answering your note of May 6th. I hope you 

 have received long ago the third edition of the * Origin.' .... 

 I have heard nothing from Triibner of the sale of your Essay, 

 hence fear it has not been great ; I wrote to say you could 

 supply more. I sent a copy to Sir J. Herschel, and in his 

 new edition of his * Physical Geography ' he has a note on 

 the ' Origin of Species,' and agrees, to a certain limited extent, 



but puts in a caution on design much like yours 



I have been led to think more on this subject of late, and 

 grieve to say that I come to differ more from you. It is not 

 that designed variation makes, as it seems to me, my deity 

 " Natural Selection " superfluous, but rather from studying, 

 lately, domestic variation, and seeing what an enormous field 

 of undesigned variability there is ready for natural selection 

 to appropriate for any purpose useful to each creature. 



I thank you much for sending me your review of Phillips.* 

 I remember once telling you a lot of trades which you ought 

 to have followed, but now I am convinced that you are a born 

 reviewer. By Jove, how well and often you hit the nail on 

 the head ! You rank Phillips's book higher than I do, or than 

 Lyell does, who thinks it fearfully retrograde. I amused 

 myself by parodying Phillips's argument as applied to do- 

 mestic variation ; and you might thus prove that the duck or 



* i 



Life on the Earth,' i860. 



