NATURAL SELECTION. I51 



their more vigorous neighbours. The colour of this vigorous 

 race I take for granted, from what has been already said, 

 would be dark. But the same disposition to form varieties 

 still existing, a darker and a darker race would in the course 

 of time occur ; and as the darkest would be the best fitted 

 for the climate, this would at length become the most pre- 

 valent, if not the only race, in the particular country in 

 which it had originated." He then extends these same 

 views to the white iuhabitants of colder climates. Although 

 Wells clearly expresses and recognizes the principle of 

 natural selection, yet it is applied by him only to the very 

 limited problem of the origin of human races, and not at 

 all to that of the origin of animal and vegetable species. 

 Darwin's great merit in having independently developed 

 the Theory of Selection, and having brought it to complete 

 and well merited recognition, is as little affected by the 

 earher and long forgotten remark of Wells, as by some other 

 fragmentary observations about natural selection made by 

 Patrick Mathew, and hidden in his book on "Timber for 

 Shipbuilding, and the Cultivation of Trees," which appeared 

 in 1831. The celebrated traveller, Alfred Wallace, who 

 developed the Theory of Selection independently of Darwin, 

 and had published.it in 1858, simultaneously with Darwin's 

 first contribution, likewise stands far behind his greater and 

 elder countryman in regard to profound conception, as 

 well as to extended application of the theory. In fact Dar- 

 win, by his extremely comprehensive and ingenious develop- 

 ment of the whole doctrine, has acquired a fair claim to see 

 the theory connected with his own name. 



This Theory of Selection, Darwinism in its proper sense, 

 to the consideration of which we now turn our attention. 



