DARWIN'S LOVE FOR ANIMALS 73 



experiments on living animals. Therefore the 

 proposal to limit research to points of which we 

 can now see the bearings in regard to health, 

 &c., I look at as puerile.' 1 Some years later, 

 only a few weeks before his death, he wrote, 

 referring to Edmund Gurney's articles on vivi- 

 section : 



' . . . I agree with almost everything he says, except with 

 some passages which appear to imply that no experiments 

 should be tried unless some immediate good can be predicted, 

 and this is a gigantic mistake contradicted by the whole 

 history of science.' 2 



We also meet with clear evidence of Darwin's 

 love, almost always humorously expressed, for 

 the children of his brain, his hypotheses. Thus, 

 when studying the development of tendrils, he 

 was able to show a beautiful gradation between 

 these organs and leaves, but was utterly puzzled 

 by the vine, in which they are known to be 

 modified branches. He discussed the point in 

 a letter to Hooker, and finished up with the 

 words: 'I would give a guinea if vine-tendrils 

 could be found to be leaves.' 3 Later on he dis- 

 covered a plant with branches possessing the 

 qualities which seemed essential in the fore- 

 runners of these sensitive organs, and he wrote 



1 To his daughter, Mrs. Litchfield, Jan. 4, 1875. Life and Letters, 

 iii. 202. 



2 To Sir Lander Brunton, Feb. 14, 1882. Ibid., 210 ; also More 

 Letters, ii. 441. Edmund Gurney's articles appeared in the 

 Fortnightly Review, 1881, xxx. 778 and CornhiU Magazine, 1882, 

 xlv. 191. 



3 Feb., 1864 (?). More Letters, ii. 342. 



