cH.xiii.J REVIEWS AND CRITICISMS, 1860. 257 



it demonstrates that you have thought a good deal lately 

 on Xatural Selection. Few things have surprised me more 

 than the entire paucity of objections and difficulties new to 

 me in the published reviews. Your remarks are of a differ- 

 ent stamp and new to me." 



C. D. to Asa Gray. [Hartfield, Sussex] July 22nd [I860]. 



My dear Gray, Owing to absence from home at 

 water-cure and then having to move my sick girl to whence 

 I am now writing, I have onlv latelv read the discussion in 

 Proc. American Acad.* and now I cannot resist expressing 

 my sincere admiration of your most clear powers of reason- 

 ing. As Hooker latelv said in a note to me, vou are more 

 than any one else the thorough master of the subject. I 

 declare that you know my book as well as I do myself ; and 

 bring to the question new lines of illustration and argu- 

 ment in a manner which excites my astonishment and al- 

 most my envy ! f I admire these discussions, I think, almost 

 more than your article in SillimwrCs Journal. Every single 

 word seems weighed carefully, and tells like a 32-pound 

 shot. It makes me much wish (but I know that you have 

 not time) that you could write more in detail, and give, for 

 instance, the facts on the variability of the American wild 

 fruits. The Atheimum has the largest circulation, and I 

 have sent my copy to the editor with a request that he 

 would republish the first discussion ; I much fear he will 

 not, as he reviewed the subject in so hostile a spirit. . . . 

 I shall be curious [to see], and will order the August num- 

 ber, as soon as I know that it contains your review of re- 

 views. My conclusion is that you have made a mistake in 

 being a botanist, you ought to have been a lawyer. 



The following passages from a letter to Huxley (Dec. 2nd, 

 I860) may serve to show what was my father's view of the 

 position of the subject, after a year's experience of review- 

 er's, critics and converts : 



* April 10th, 1860. Dr Gray criticised in detail "several of the positions 

 taken at the preceding meeting by Mr. [J. A.] Lowell, Prof. Bowen and Prof. 

 Agassiz." It was reprinted in the Athenceum, Aug. 4th, 1860. 



t On Sept. 26th, 1860, he wrote in the same sense to Gray : " You never 

 touch the subject without making it clearer. I look at it as even more ex- 

 traordinary that you never say a word or use an epithet which does not ex- 

 press fully my meaning. Now Lyell, Hooker, and others, who perfectly 

 understand my book, yet sometimes use expressions to which I demur." 



