18411882] ICE-ACTION 157 



politics, and science is done for. Many men can make fair Letter 505 

 M.P.'s ; and how few can work in science like him ! 



I have been reading a pamphlet by Verlot on " Variation 

 of Flowers," which seems to me very good ; but I doubt 

 whether it would be worth your reading. It was published 

 originally in the Journal cfHort., and so perhaps you have 

 seen it. It is a very good plan this republishing separately 

 for sake of foreigners buying, and I wish I had tried to get 

 permission of Linn. Soc. for my Climbing paper, but it is 

 now too late. 



Do not forget that you have my paper on hybridism, by 

 Max Wichura. 1 



I hope you are returned to your work, refreshed like a 

 giant by your huge breakfasts. How unlucky you are about 

 contagious complaints with your children ! 



I keep very weak, and had much sickness yesterday, but 

 am stronger this morning. 



Can you remember how we ever first met ? 2 It was in 

 Park Street ; but what brought us together ? I have been 

 re-reading a few old letters of yours, and my heart is very 

 warm towards you. 



To C. Lyell. Letter 506 



Down, March 8th [1866]. 



In a letter from Sir Joseph Hooker to Mr. Darwin on Feb. 2ist, 

 1866, the following passage occurs: "I wish I could explain to you 

 my crude notions as to the Glacial period and your position towards it. 

 I suppose I hold this doctrine : that there was a Glacial period, but 

 that it was not one of universal cold, because I think that the 

 existing distribution of glaciers is sufficiently demonstrative of the 

 proposition that by comparatively slight redispositions of sea and 

 land, and perhaps axis of globe, you may account for all the leading 

 palaeontological phenomena." This letter was sent by Mr. Darwin to 

 Sir Charles Lyell, and the latter, writing on March ist, 1866, expresses 

 his belief that "the whole globe must at times have been superficially 

 cooler. Still," he adds, "during extreme excentricity the sun would 

 make great efforts to compensate in perihelion for the chill of a long 

 winter in aphelion in one hemisphere, and a cool summer in the 

 other. I think you will turn out to be right in regard to meridional 

 lines of mountain-chains by which the migrations across the equator 

 took place while there was contemporaneous tropical heat of certain 



1 Wichura, M. E., " L'Hybridisation dans ie regne vegetal etudiee 

 sur les Saules," Arch. Sci. Phys. Nat., XXI II., p. 129, 1865. 



2 See Life and Letters, II., p. 19. 



