124 LIFE OF 



For they didn't know how to make beds ; 



They hadn't got huts, 



They dined upon nuts, 

 Which they cracked upon each other's heads. 



They hadn't much scope 



For a comb, brush, or soap, 

 Or towels, or kettle, or fire ; 



They had no coats nor capes, 



For ne'er did these apes 

 Invent what they didn't require. 



From these though descended, 



Our manners are mended, 

 Though still we can grin and backbite ; 



We cut up each other, 



Be he friend or brother, 

 And tails are the fashion at night. 



This origination 



Is all speculation 

 We gamble in various shapes ; 



So Mr. Darwin 



May speculate in 

 Our ancestors having been apes." 



The Athenaum was unbelieving, but not denunciatory. 

 The Edinburgh Review declared the doctrine of natural 

 selection hopelessly inadequate to explain the phenomena 

 of man's body ; although its truth and falsehood had no 

 necessary connection with the general theory of evolution : 

 some law as yet unknown being looked for. Darwin's 

 attempt to explain the evolution of mind and the moral 

 sense is regarded as failing in every point. " Never, 

 perhaps, in the history of philosophy, have such wide 

 generalisations been derived from such a small basis 

 of fact." The Quarterly Review now acknowledged that 



