846 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of his theory Darwin most desired to 

 enjoy, and were the three to Avhom he 

 earliest and most fully confided his 

 views. Yet Gray and he did not 

 agree entirely in their acceptance of 

 the theory. While Darwin gave the 

 predominant place to the environment 

 in determining variation, Gray thought 

 that the process worked more from 

 within and was at most modified or 

 limited by the external conditions. 

 Darwin had extreme difficulty in ac- 

 cepting the conception of a Supreme 

 Intelligence ordaining and controlling 

 the process of evolution ; Gray held to 

 a complete harmony between the work- 

 ing of a Supreme Power and of evolu- 

 tion, and declared that " natural law is 

 the human conception of continued and 

 orderly divine action." 



Professor Gray\s "Statistics of the 

 Flora of the United States " and his 

 observations on the plants of Japan 

 have an important bearing upon the 

 theory of the origin of animal and 

 vegetable life in the polar regions and 

 their distribution thence down the con- 

 tinents, wliieh is now advocated by 

 biologists and paleontologists of high 

 standing. 



Professor Gray has not been con- 

 spicuous as a man of letters, but we may 

 justly claim for his botanical works a 

 place in literature as such. lie contrib- 

 uted to the " American Journal of Sci- 

 ence " biographical notices of deceased 

 botanists and reviews of botanical work 

 in which his accurate criticisms were 

 tempered by a uniform kindliness of 

 spirit, and he made considerable con- 

 tributions to the " North American Re- 

 view," " The Nation," and the "Atlan- 

 tic Monthly." A volume of selections 

 from these contributions, with a chap- 

 ter on " Evolutionary Teleology," was 

 published in 1876, under the title of 

 "Darwiniana." 



Professor Gray's personal character 

 was admirably characterized by Dar- 

 win, who concluded, before he had 

 even seen him, from reading some of 



his letters to Hooker, that he must be 

 a man with something very lovable 

 about him. A friend, paying a tribute 

 to him in the London " Spectator," 

 speaks warmly of his " singularly sweet 

 and beautiful nature," and of "the 

 freshness and brightness that recalled 

 nothing but youth," of w'hich not years 

 nor learning, nor incessant studies, nor 

 even the classification of the American 

 Compositm, could deprive him ; and 

 added that Darwin's son, to whom he 

 sent a parcel of stamps to cheer his sick- 

 bed, " was not the only English child 

 who received a like present from the 

 same giver." 



"What the world of science thought 

 of Asa Gray is attested by the honors 

 which its schools and its societies con- 

 ferred upon him, and by the respect, as 

 to one having authority, in which he is 

 invariably spoken of by its most distin- 

 guished writers. American feeling was 

 reflected in the token which was pre- 

 sented to him a little more than two 

 years ago by one hundred and eighty- 

 five botanists, all in a sense his stu- 

 dents, with Mr. Lowell's quatrain. 



Professor Gray was taken away 

 from the midst of his work. He had 

 just completed a review of Darwin's 

 "Life and Letters," had not quite fin- 

 ished the revision of his "Vitaceee," 

 and was busy with his " Necrology " 

 for the " Journal of Science," when he 

 was stricken. 



now IT WORKS. 



OxE of the recognized evils attend- 

 ant on the public-school system of this 

 country is the insecurity of the ten- 

 ure by which teachers hold their situa- 

 tions. So manifest an evil has this 

 been that in certain States it has been 

 proposed to remedy it by legislation. 

 But, supposing the evil entirely re- 

 moved, what would the result be ? We 

 can perhaps judge by what one of the 

 best conducted of our educational jour- 

 nals says is the case in the great State of 

 Hlinois. We are not aware at this mo- 



