i867— 1SS2] FLORA OF JAPAN ~ 



of x+y has been raised on the selfsame facts, you boo-bcx 383 



Take another dose of Huxley's penultimate G. S. Addr> 

 and send George back to college. 



To J. D. Hooker. 



Feb. 3rd [1868]. 

 I am now reading Miquel on Flora of J> and like 



it : it is rather a relief to me (though, of course, not ne 

 to you) to find so very much in common with A-ia. I 

 wonder if A. Murray's 3 notion can be correct, that a [profound] 

 arm of the sea penetrated the west cc - : N Americ 

 and prevented the Asiatico-Japan element colonising that 

 side of the continent so much as the eastern side ; or will 

 climate suffice ? I shall to the day of my death keep up 

 my full interest in Geograph. Distribution, but I doubt whether 

 I shall ever have strength to come in any fuller detail than in 

 the Origi)i to this grand subject. In fact. I do not suppose 

 any man could master so comprehensive a subject as it 

 now has become, if all kingdoms of nature are included. I 

 have read Murray's book, and am disappointed — though, 

 as you said, here and there clever thoughts occur. H 



1 Huxley's Anniversary Address to the Geological Soc, 1S69 (Q 

 Essays, VIII.. p. 305). This is a criticism of Lord Kelvin's paper "On 

 Geological Time" (Trans. Geolog. Soc. Glasgo^c. III. . At 1 Mr. 



Huxley deals with Lord Kelvin's "third line of argument, based on the 

 temperature of the interior of the earth." This was no doubt the point 

 most disturbing to Mr. Darwin, since it led Lord Kelvin to as 

 quoted by Huxley, "Are modern geologists prepared to say that all 

 life was killed off the earth 50,000, 100,000. or 200,000 years ago ? " Mr. 

 Huxley, after criticising Lord Kelvin's data and conclusion, gives his 

 conviction that the case against Geology has broken down. With regard 

 to evolution, Huxley (p. 32S1 ingeniously points out a case of circular 

 reasoning. " But it may be said that it is b and not geolo, 



which asks for so much time— that the succession of life demand 

 intervals; but this appears to me to be reasoning in a circle. Bi 

 takes her time from geology. The only reason we have for be! 

 in the slow rate of the change in living forms is the fact that they 

 through a series of deposits which, geology informs us. have taken a long 

 while to make. If the geological clock is wrong, all the natural - 

 have to do is to modify his notions of the rapidity of change accordingly." 



1 Miquel, " Flore du Japon " : 67. 



3 Geograpk f Mammals, by Andrew Murray, 1S66. 



See Chapter Y.. p. 47. See Letter 37 



