1888 



ARGUMENT OF THE 'ORIGIN' 63 



The most curious feature I note in it is that neither 

 of them seems to have mastered the principles of Darwin's 

 theory. See the bottom of p. 19 and the top of p. 20. 

 As I understand Darwin there is nothing "Anti- Dar- 

 winian" in either of the 'two doctrines mentioned. 



Darwin has left the causes of variation and the 

 question whether it is limited or directed by external 

 conditions perfectly open. 



The only serious work I have been attempting lately 

 is Darwin's obituary. I do a little every day, but get 

 on very slowly. I have read the life and letters all 

 through again, and the Origin for the sixth or seventh 

 time, becoming confirmed in my opinion that it is one of 

 the most difficult books to exhaust that ever was written. 



I have a notion of writing out the argument of the 

 Origin in systematic shape as a sort of primer of 

 Darwinisrmis. I have not much stuff left in me, and it 

 would be as good a way of using what there is as I know 

 of. What do you think ? — Ever yours, 



T. H. Huxley. 



In reply to this Sir J. Hooker was inclined to 



make the biographer alone responsible for the 



confusion noted in the obituary of Asa Gray. He 

 writes : — 



March 27, 1888. 



Dear Huxley — Dana's Gray arrived yesterday, and I 

 turned to pp. 19, 20. I see nothing Anti-Darwinian in 

 the passages, and I do not gather from them that Gray 

 did. 



I did not follow Gray into his later comments on 

 Darwinism, and I never read his Darwiniana. My recol- 

 lection of his attitude after acceptance of the doctrine, 

 and during the first few years of his active promulga- 

 tion of it, is that he understood it clearly, but sought to 



