1864— 1869] NATURAL SELECTION 267 



as I understand, both female forms occur on the same island. Letter 189 



I quite agree with your distinction between dimorphic forms 



and varieties ; but I doubt whether your criterion of dimorphic 



forms not producing intermediate offspring will suffice, for 



I know of a good many varieties which must be so called 



that will not blend or intermix, but produce offspring quite 



like either parent. 



I have been particularly struck with your remarks on 

 geographical distribution in Celebes. It is impossible that 

 anything could be better put, and would give a cold shudder 

 to the immutable naturalists. 



And now I am going to ask a question which you will not 

 like. How docs your journal get on? It will be a shame if 

 you do not popularise your researches. 



A. R. Wallace to C. Darwin. Letter 190 



Hurstpierpoint, Sussex, July 2nd, 1S66. 



I have been so repeatedly struck by the utter inability of 

 numbers of intelligent persons to sec clearly, or at all, the 

 self-acting and necessary effects of Natural Selection, that 

 I am led to conclude that the term itself, and your mode of 

 illustrating it, however clear and beautiful to many of us, are 

 yet not the best adapted to impress it on the general naturalist 

 public. The two last cases of the misunderstanding are : (1) 

 the article on " Darwin and his Teachings " in the last 

 Quarterly Journal of Science, which, though very well written 

 and on the whole appreciative, yet concludes with a charge 

 of something like blindness, in your not seeing that Natural 

 Selection requires the constant watching of an intelligent 

 " chooser," like man's selection to which you so often compare 

 it ; and (2) in Janet's recent work on the Materialism of the 

 Present Day, reviewed in last Saturday's Reader, by an extract 

 from which I see that he considers your weak point to be that 

 you do not see that " thought and direction are essential to 

 the action of Natural Selection." The same objection has 

 been made a score of times by your chief opponents, and I 

 have heard it as often stated myself in conversation. Now, 

 I think this arises almost entirely from your choice of the 

 term " Natural Selection " and so constantly comparing it in 

 its effects to Man's Selection, and also your so frequently 

 personifying nature as "selecting," as " preferring," as 



