NOTICES OF BOOKS. .377 



8, 1884.— E. F. and W. R. Linton. The pLants from Wells do not 

 quite agree with a specimen so named, gathered by Mr. C. Bailey 

 on the coast of Merioneth, but are about identical with a specimen 

 from Mr. Boswcll Syme from Scotland. It is interesting to have 

 a new locality for a variety of which the ' Student's Flora ' states 

 nothing satisfactory is known. ' J. lamprocarpus fructibus nigro- 

 fuscis.' — Dr. Buchenau. ' J. lamprocarpus v. nuiriteUuH Don. — Dr. 

 J. Lange " (p. 115. 



" Festnca ' ylauca.' Uig, Skye, Aug. 6, 1884. — F. F. Linton. 

 ' Is a form of F. rubra L., which is not specially described in my 

 Monograph Fest. europ. It comes nearest to F. riihra, sub-v. 

 juncea (Mon. p. 139), but differs by its very glaucous leaves, this 

 colour being due to a thin stratum of vegetable wax. I call it 

 F. rubra, suh-\. pruirosa [pruijiosa .^] (nov. forma).' — Hackel in litt. 

 ' These seem to be creeping plants allied to rubra.' — 0. G. Babington. 



Charles Darwin. By Grant Allen. ' English Worthies ' Series. 



Longmans. 



Mr. Grant Allen's book is a veritable triumphant march. 

 Every page is bright with epithets, — " central Darwinian luminary," 

 " magnificent all- sided conception," " stately fabric of vast 

 theories," — as so many gaudy banners on which is inscribed the 

 defeat and rout of the teleological school : of all, that is, who 

 profess to see in nature the working of any intelligence higher than 

 human. We are reminded of the complacent utterance of the 

 panegyrist of Epicurus — 



Quare religio pedibus subjecta vicissim 

 Obteritur, nos extequat victoria coelo. 



But a triumphant march is not a victory, although it may lead 

 light-headed people to suppose that a victory has been gained. It 

 is simply a " demonstration," in the modern political sense of a 

 show and pageant, that proves nothing, but is got up to seem to 

 mean much. 



But rhetoric aside, an arm of offence which teleologists can 

 brandish as well as Darwinists, we ask what view of the universe 

 it is that Mr. Grant Allen wishes us to accept on the strength 

 of Darwin's discoveries. The sum is this, that matter is prior to 

 mind, mind being the growth and outcome of matter : that there is 

 no intelligence above man's, none at least that has anything to do 

 with the world in which man moves : that a house is a thing 

 planned and contrived, not so the architect — he is " the last product 

 of kinetic solar energy," energy that needed neither creation to 

 start it, nor providence to direct its course. And the proof ? It is 

 the old story. First a hot, spinning nebula, or something of that 

 kind. A certain degree of heat, no doubt : call that x. And a 

 certain density, uniform or varying: call the average density y. 

 And a certain angular velocity of rotation : call it z. These are 

 definite quantities. Now we ask, why ;i-, y, z, rather than any 

 other quantities, x', y', z"> That is due, we are told, to the previous 

 unknown history of the nebula. That answer is mere shuffling. 



