56 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY 



CUAP. Ill 



slowly, I am legularly done for at tlie end of it. I 

 expect there has been more mischief than I thought for 

 How about the Bill ? — Ever yours, 



T. H. H0XLEY. 



However, he and Mr. Spencer wrote their minds 

 to each other on the subject, and as Huxley remarks 

 with reference to this occasion, " the process does us 

 both good, and in no way interferes with our 

 friendship." 



The letter immediately following, to Mr. Eomanes, 

 answers an inquiry about a passage quoted from 

 Huxley's writings by Professor Schurraan in his 

 Ethical I'mport of Darwinism. This passage, made up 

 of sentences from two different essays, runs as 

 follows : — 



It is quite conceivable that every species tends to 

 produce varieties of a limited number and kind, and that 

 the effect of natural selection is to favour the develop- 

 ment of some of these, while it opposes the development 

 of others along their predetermined line of modification.^ 

 A whale does not tend to vary in the direction of pro- 

 ducing feathers, nor a bird in the direction of producing 

 whalebone.'- 



" On the strength of these extracts " (writes Mr. 

 Eomanes), " Schurman represents you ' to presuppose 

 design, since development takes place along certain pre- 

 determined lines of modification.' But as he does not 

 give references, and as I do not remember the passages, I 

 cannot consult the context, which I fancy must give a 

 different colouring to the extracts." 



1 Coll. Ess. ii. 223. 

 2 In "Mr. Darwiu's Critics," 1871 ; Coll. Ess. ii. 181. 



