xi] OF EVOLUTION 139 



part of Benjamin Disraeli, who after stigmatising 

 Darwinism as the question 'Is man an ape or an 

 angel ? 'declared magniloquently to the episcopal 

 chairman, 'My Lord, I am on the side of the angels ! ' 



But in spite of attacks like these and numerous 

 bitter pasquinades and comic cartoons perhaps to 

 some extent in consequence of them Darwin's views 

 became widely known and eagerly discussed, so that 

 the circulation of the Origin of Species went up by 

 leaps and bounds. Nevertheless, as Huxley said, 

 1 years had to pass away before misrepresentation, 

 ridicule and denunciation, ceased to be the most 

 notable constituents of the multitudinous criticisms 

 of his work which poured from the press.' 



Among his contemporary men of science Darwin 

 could at first count few converts. Hooker, whose 

 candid and valuable criticisms of his friend's work 

 had been continued up to the very end during its 

 composition, did an eminent service to the cause 

 of Evolution by publishing, almost simultaneously 

 with the Origin of Species, his splendid memoir on 

 The Flora of Australia, its Origin, Affinities, and 

 Distribution, in which similar views were, not ob- 

 scurely, indicated. Of Lyell, Darwin's other friend 

 and counsellor, Huxley justly says : 



'Lyell, up to that time a pillar of the antitransmutationists 

 (who regarded him, ever afterwards, as Pallas Athene may have 

 looked at Dian, after the Endymion affair), declared himself 



