18591863] GERMAN TRANSLATION 173 



and very fairly that I can in no one instance explain the Letter "5 

 course of modification in any particular instance. I could 

 make some sort of answer to your case of the two rats ; and 

 might I not turn round and ask him who believes in the 

 separate creation of each species, why one rat has a longer 

 tail or shorter ears than another ? I presume that most 

 people would say that these characters were of some use, or 

 stood in some connection with other parts; and if so, Natural 

 Selection would act on them. But as you put the case, it 

 tells well against me. You argue most justly against my 

 question, whether the many species were created as eggs 1 or 

 as mature, etc. I certainly had no right to ask that question. 

 I fully agree that there might have been as well a hundred 

 thousand creations as eight or ten, or only one. But then, on 

 the view of eight or ten creations (i.e. as many as there are 

 distinct types of structure) we can on my view understand 

 the homological and embryological resemblance of all the 

 organisms of each type, and on this ground almost alone I 

 disbelieve in the innumerable acts of creation. There are 

 only two points on which I think you have misunderstood 

 me. I refer only to one Glacial period as affecting the 

 distribution of organic beings ; I did not wish even to allude 

 to the doubtful evidence of glacial action in the Permian and 

 Carboniferous periods. Secondly, I do not believe that the 

 process of development has always been carried on at the 

 same rate in all different parts of the world. Australia is 

 opposed to such belief. The nearly contemporaneous equal 

 development in past periods I attribute to the slow migration 

 of the higher and more dominant forms over the whole 

 world, and not to independent acts of development in different 

 parts. Lastly, permit me to add that I cannot see the force 

 of your objection, that nothing is effected until the origin of 

 life is explained : surely it is worth while to attempt to 

 follow out the action of electricity, though we know not 

 what electricity is. 



If you should at any time do me the favour of writing to 

 me, I should be very much obliged if you would inform me 

 whether you have yourself examined Brehm's subspecies of 

 birds ; for 1 have looked through some of his writings, but 



1 See Letter no, p. 163. 



