ATTITUDE OF WORKING NATURALISTS. 239 



Before tlie publication of Darwin's first volume, 

 M. Alphonse de Canclolle had summed up the result 

 of his studies in this regard, in the final chapter of his 

 classical "Geographie Botanique Baisonnee," in the 

 conclusion, that existing vegetation must be regarded 

 as the continuation, through many geological and 

 geographical changes, of the anterior vegetations of 

 the world ; and that, consequently, the present distri- 

 bution of species is explicable only in the light of their 

 geological history. He surmised that, notwithstand- 

 ing the general stability of forms, certain species or 

 quasi-species might have originated through diversi- 

 fication under geographical isolation. But, on the 

 other hand, he w r as still disposed to admit that even 

 the same species might have originated independently 

 in two or more different regions of the world ; and he 

 declined, as unpractical and unavailing, all attempts 

 to apply hypotheses to the elucidation of the origin 

 of species. Soon after Darwin's book appeared, De 

 Candolle had occasion to study systematically a large 

 and wide-spread genus — that of the oak. Investigat- 

 ing it under the new lisrht of natural selection, he 

 came to the conclusion that the existing oaks are all 

 descendants of earlier forms, and that no clear line 

 can be drawn between the diversification which has 



tion, at its recent meeting, by its president, the veteran Phillips, perhaps 

 the oldest surviving geologist after Lyell; and, 2. That of Prof. All- 

 man, President of the Biological Section. The first touches the subject 

 briefly, but in the way of favorable suggestion ; the second is a full and 

 discriminating exposition of the reasons which seem to assure at least 

 the provisional acceptance of the hypothesis, as a guide in all biological 

 studies, " a key to the order and hidden forces of the world of life." 



