2 THE DARWINIAN HYPOTHESIS 
this simple word which may be culled from / 
authoritative sources; and if, leaving terms and 
theoretical subtleties aside, we turn to facts and 
endeavour to gather a meaning for ourselves, by 
studying the things to which, in practice, the 
name of species is applied, it profits us little. For 
practice varies as much as theory. Let two 
botanists or two zoologists examine and describe 
the productions of a country, and one will pretty 
certainly disagree with the other as to the number, 
limits, and definitions of the species into which he 
groups the very same things! In these islands, we 
are in the habit of regarding mankind as of one 
species, but a fortnight’s steam will land us in a 
country where divines and savants, for once in 
agreement, vie with one another in loudness of 
assertion, if not in cogency of proof, that men are 
of different species; and, more partic ‘arly, that 
the species negro is so distinct from our own that 
the Ten Commandments have actually no reference 
to him. Even in the calm region of entomology, — 
where, if anywhere in this sinful world, passion 
and prejudice should fail to stir the mind, one 
learned coleopterist will fill ten attractive volumes 
with descriptions of species of beetles, nine-tenths 
of which are immediately declared by his brother 
beetle-mongers to be no species at all. 
The truth is that the number of distinguishable 
living creatures almost surpasses imagination. At 
least 100,000 such kinds of insects alone have been 
