1S59-1863] POLAR BEAR 179 



To James Lamont. Letter 120 



Down, Feb. 25th [1861]. 



I am extremely much obliged for your very kind present 

 of your beautiful work, Seasons with the Sea-Horses ;" IJ and 

 I have no doubt that I shall find much interesting from so 

 careful and acute an observer as yourself. 



P.S. I have just been cutting the leaves of your book, 

 and have been very much pleased and surprised at your note 

 about what you wrote in Spitzbergen. As you thought it out 

 independently, it is no wonder that you so clearly understand 

 Natural Selection, which so few of my reviewers do or 

 pretend not to do. 



I never expected to see any one so heroically bold as to 

 defend my bear illustration. 2 But a man who has done all 

 that you have done must be bold ! It is laughable how often 

 I have been attacked and misrepresented about this bear. I 

 am much pleased with your remarks, and thank you cordially 

 for coming to the rescue. 



1 Seasons with the Sea- Horses ; or, Sporting Adventures in the 

 Nor/hern Seas. London, 186 1. Mr. Lamont {Joe. eit., p. 273) writes ; 

 " The polar bear seems to me to be nothing more than a variety of the 

 bears inhabiting Northern Europe, Asia, and America ; and it surely 

 requires no very great stretch of the imagination to suppose that this 

 variety was originally created, not as we see him now, but by individuals 

 of Ursus arctos in Siberia, who, finding their means of subsistence running 

 short, and pressed by hunger, ventured on the ice and caught some seals. 

 These individuals would find that they could make a subsistence in this 

 way, and would take up their residence on the shore and gradually take 

 to a life on the ice. . . . Then it stands to reason that those individuals 

 who might happen to be palest in colour would have the best chance of 

 succeeding in surprising seals. . . . The process of Natural Selection 

 would do the rest, and Ursus arctos would in the course of a few 

 thousands, or a few millions of years, be transformed into the variety at 

 present known as Ursus maritimus." The author adds the following 

 footnote (op. cit., p. 275) : " It will be obvious to any one that I follow 

 Mr. Darwin in these remarks ; and, although the substance of this 

 chapter was written in Spitzbergen, before The Origin of Species was 

 published, I do not claim any originality for my views ; and I also cheer- 

 fully acknowledge that, but for the publication of that work in connection 

 with the name of so distinguished a naturalist, I never would have 

 ventured to give to the world my own humble opinions on the subject." 



a " In North America the black bear was seen by Hearne swimming 

 for hours with widely open mouth, thus catching, almost like a whale, 

 insects in the water." — Origin, Ed. vi., p. 141. See Letter no, p. 162. 



