498 THE MAKING OF THE ' OKIGIN ' 



been presented in consecutive form, -there was the constant 

 probability that criticism on a single point could not know that 

 it was already outflanked by a previous argument, developed 

 elsewhere by the author, but not impressed on the critic in this 

 particular connection. Thus replying to Hooker, who finds 

 the changes effected by external conditions inconstant and 

 unequal to modifying species, Darwin urges (November 11, 

 1856) that the external conditions by themselves do very little 

 in producing new species, except as causing mere variability 

 upon which selection can work. He feels strongly that to make 

 this clear, he ought to have sent Hooker a preliminary note 

 on variation and its causes. 



In this connection it may be noted that even after the 

 publication of the ' Origin ' Hooker continued to lay more stress 

 on external conditions than did Darwin, who explains (May 29, 

 1860) that he sees in almost every organism (though far more 

 clearly in animals than in plants) adaptation, and this, except 

 in rare instances, must, he thinks, be due to selection. 1 



Again (March 16, 1858) Darwin finds the reason for various 

 difficulties raised by Hooker in the fact that probably he has 

 not yet sufficiently explained his notions, and begs his friend to 

 await the MS. dealing with these points. So when he does send 



1 Thus, in March 1862, Hooker wrote to Bates : * I am sure that with you 

 as with me, the more you think the less occasion you will see for anything but 

 time and natural selection to effect change ; and that this view is the simplest 

 and clearest in the present state of science is one advantage, at any rate. 

 Indeed, I think that it is, in the present state of the inquiry, the legitimate 

 position to take up ; it is time enough to bother our heads with the secondary 

 cause when there is some evidence of it or some demand for it at present I 

 do not see one or the other, and so feel inclined to renounce any other for the 

 present.' Hereupon Darwin finds it ' curiously satisfactory ' to see him and Bates 

 4 believing more fully in Natural Selection than I think I even do myself ' ; but 

 he startled Darwin in November with the frank confession that every single 

 difference which we see might have occurred without any selection, having got 

 right round the subject and viewed it from an entirely opposite and new side. 

 4 1 do and have always fully agreed,' is Darwin's answer, but under certain 

 provisos, which in fact do not seem to occur. See M.L. i. 212, 199, and 223. 



[Henry Walter Bates (1825-92), the ' Naturalist on the Amazons.' His 

 boyish zeal for entomology took fuller shape under the inspiration of A. R. 

 Wallace, with whom he set out in 1848 for these unharvested regions. Here he 

 spent eleven years. His wide researches into the insect fauna and the problems 

 of mimicry led him towards the theory of natural selection; and he became at 

 once a staunch supporter of Darwin when he returned in 1859. From 1864 until 

 his death he was Assistant Secretary to the Royal Geographical Society, and he 

 was elected F.R.S. in 1881.] 



