238 SPREAD OF EVOLUTION. [1866. 



therefore be expected not to be agreeable), Mr. Darwin an- 

 ticipated the remark, by asking how the hypothesis was to 

 meet the case of these feelings. In the conversation which 

 followed, he said the occasion in his own life, when he was 

 most affected by the emotions of the sublime was when he 

 stood upon one of the summits of the Cordillera, and sur- 

 veyed the magnificent prospect all around. It seemed, as he 

 quaintly observed, as if his nerves had become fiddle-strings, 

 and had all taken to rapidly vibrating. This remark was 

 only made incidentally, and the conversation passed into 

 some other branch. About an hour afterwards Mr. Darwin 

 retired to rest, while I sat up in the smoking-room with one 

 of his sons. We continued smoking and talking for several 

 hours, when at about one o'clock in the morning the door 

 gently opened and Mr. Darwin appeared, in his slippers and 

 dressing-gown. As nearly as I can remember, the following 

 are the words he used : — 



*' ' Since I went to bed I have been thinking over our con- 

 versation in the drawing-room, and it has just occurred to 

 me that I was wrong in telling you I felt most of the sublime 

 when on the top of the Cordillera ; I am quite sure that I 

 felt it even more when in the forests of Brazil. I thought it 

 best to come and tell you this at once in case I should be 

 putting you wrong. I am sure now that I felt most sublime 

 in the forests.' 



'' This was all he had come to say, and it was evident that 

 he had come to do so, because he thought that the fact of his 

 feeling ^ most sublime in forests ' was more in accordance 

 with the hypothesis which we had been discussing, than the 

 fact which he had previously stated. Now, as no one knew 

 better than Mr. Darwin the difference between a speculation 

 and a fact, I thought this little exhibition of scientific con- 

 scientiousness very noteworthy, where the only question con- 

 cerned was of so highly speculative a character. I should not 

 have been so much impressed if he had thought that by his 

 temporary failure of memory he had put me on a wrong scent 

 in any matter of fact, although even in such a case he is the 



