1876.] GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION. 23 1 



mammals, but I must hope that you are right. I think you 

 will have to modify your belief about the difficulty of 

 dispersal of land molluscs ; I was interrupted when beginning 

 to experimentize on the just hatched young adhering to the 

 feet of ground-roosting birds. I differ on one other point, 

 viz. in the belief that there must have existed a Tertiary 

 Antarctic continent, from which various forms radiated to the 

 southern extremities of our present continents. But I could 

 go on scribbling for ever. You have written, as I believe, a 

 grand and memorable work which will last for years as the 

 foundation for all future treatises on Geographical Distribution, 

 My dear Wallace, yours very sincerely, 



Charles Darwin. 



P.S. — You have paid me the highest conceivable compliment, 

 by what you say of your work in relation to my chapters on 

 distribution in the ' Origin,' and I heartily thank you for it. 



[The following letters illustrate my father's power of taking 

 a vivid interest in work bearing on Evolution, but unconnected 

 with his own special researches at the time. The books 

 referred to in the first letter are Professor Weismann's 

 ' Studien zur Descendenzlehre,' * being part of the series of 

 essays by which the author has done such admirable service 

 to the cause of Evolution :] 



C. Darwin to Aug. Weismann. 



... I read German so slowly, and have had lately to read 

 several other papers, so that I have as yet finished only half 

 of your first essay and two-thirds of your second. They 

 have excited my interest and admiration in the highest 

 degree, and whichever I think of last, seems to me the most 



* My father contributed a pre- lation of Prof. Weismann's ' Stu- 

 fatory note to Mr. Meldola's trans- dien,' 1880-81. 



