78 DICTIONARY OF BIRDS 
ing the encomiums passed upon it by friendly crities (Rev. de Zoologie, 
1860, pp. 176-183, 313-325, 370-373).1 
Until about this time systematists, almost without exception, may be 
said to have been wandering with no definite purpose. At leasttheir purpose 
was indefinite compared with that which they now have before them. 
No doubt they all agreed in saying that they were prosecuting a search 
for what they called the True System of Nature; but that was nearly 
the end of their agreement, for in what that True System consisted the 
opinions of scarcely any two would coincide, unless to own that it was 
some shadowy idea beyond the present power of mortals to reach or even 
comprehend. The Quinarians, who boldly asserted that they had fathomed 
the mystery of Creation, had been shewn to be no wiser than other men, 
if indeed they had not utterly befooled themselves ; for their theory at 
best could give no other explanation of things than that they were 
because they were. The conception of such a process as has now come to 
be called by the name of Evolution was certainly not novel; but except 
to two men the way in which that process was or could be possible had 
not been revealed.? Here there is no need to enter into details of the 
history of Evolutionary theories; but the annalist in every branch of 
Biology must record the eventful First of July 1858, when the now cele- 
brated views of Darwin and Mr. Wallace were first laid before the scientific 
world,? and must also notice the appearance towards the end of the follow- 
ing year of the former’s Origin of Species, which has effected one of the 
greatest revolutions of thought in this or perhaps in any century. The 
majority of biologists who had schooled themselves on other principles 
were of course slow to embrace the new doctrine ; but their hesitation was 
only the natural consequence of the caution which their scientific train- 
ing enjoined. A few there were who felt as though scales had suddenly 
dropped from their eyes, when greeted by the idea conveyed in the now 
familiar phrase “ Natural Selection” ; but even those who had hitherto 
believed, and still continued to believe, in the sanctity of “Species” at 
once perceived that their life-long study had undergone a change, that 
their old position was seriously threatened by a perilous siege, and that to 
make it good they must find new means of defence. Many bravely 
maintained their posts, and for them not a word of blame ought to be 
expressed. Some few pretended, though the contrary was notorious, that 
they had always been on the side of the new philosophy, so far as they ~ 
allowed it to be philosophy at all, and for them hardly a word of blame is 
too severe. Others after due deliberation, as became men who honestly 
desired the truth and nothing but the truth, yielded wholly or almost 
wholly to arguments which they gradually found to be irresistible. But, 
1 In this historical sketch of the progress of Ornithology it has not been thought 
necessary to mention other oological works, since they have not a taxonomic bearing 
and the chief of them are named elsewhere (p. 188, note), but to them must be added 
Mr. Poynting’s Lygs of Britis?” Birds (at present confined to the Limicola:), the figures 
of which are excellent, and Capt. Bendire’s work mentioned above (page 37). 
? Neither Lamarck nor Robert.Chambers (the now acknowledged author of Vestiges 
of Creation), though thorough evolutionists, rationally indicated any means whereby, 
to use the old phrase, ‘‘the transmutation of species” could be effected. 
3 Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society, iii. Zoology, pp. 45-62, 
