36 MAN [Chap. VIII 



Letter our idea of beauty, intellectual expression, and refinement of 

 406 manner, which often makes the less appear the more beauti- 

 ful. Mere physical beauty — i.e. a healthy and regular 

 development of the body and features approaching to the 

 mean and type of European man, I believe is quite as 

 frequent in one class of society as the other, and much more 

 frequent in rural districts than in cities. 



With regard to the rank of man in zoological classification, 

 I fear I have not made myself intelligible. I never meant to 

 adopt Owen's or any other such views, but only to point out 

 that from one point of view he was right. I hold that a 

 distinct family for Man, as Huxley allows, is all that can 

 possibly be given him zoologically. But at the same time, if 

 my theory is true, that while the animals which surrounded 

 him have been undergoing modification in all parts of their 

 bodies to a generic or even family degree of difference, he 

 has been changing almost wholly in the brain and head — 

 then in geological antiquity the species man may be as old as 

 many mammalian families, and the origin of the family man 

 may date back to a period when some of the orders first 

 originated. 



As to the theory of Natural Selection itself, I shall always 

 maintain it to be actually yours and yours only. You had 

 worked it out in details I had never thought of, years before 

 I had a ray of light on the subject, and my paper would 

 never have convinced anybody or been noticed as more than 

 an ingenious speculation, whereas your book has revolution- 

 ised the study of Natural History, and carried away captive 

 the best men of the present age. All the merit I claim is the 

 having been the means of inducing you to write and publish 

 at once. I may possibly some day go a little more into this 

 subject (of Man), and if I do will accept the kind offer of 

 your notes. 



I am now, however, beginning to write the " Narrative of 

 my Travels," which will occupy me a long time, as I hate 

 writing narrative, and after Bates' brilliant success rather 

 fear to fail. 



I shall introduce a few chapters on Geographical Distribution 

 and other such topics. Sir C. Lyell, while agreeing with my 

 main argument on Man, thinks I am wrong in wanting to 

 put him back into Miocene times, and thinks I do not appre- 



