1891 FRENCH TRANSLATIONS OF HIS WORKS 203 



if you care to have it. But I have my doubts aloout its 

 acceptability to a French public which I imagine knows 

 little about Bibliolatry and the ways of Protestant 

 clericalism, and cares less. 



These essays represent a controversy which has been 

 going on for five or six years about Genesis, the deluge, 

 the miracle of the herd of swine, and the miraculous 

 generally, between Gladstone, the ecclesiastical principal 

 of King's College, various bishops, the writer of Lux 

 Muncli, that spoilt Scotch minister the Duke of Argyll, 

 and myself. 



My object has been to stir up my countrymen to think 

 about these things ; and the only use of controversy is 

 that it appeals to their love of fighting, and secures their 

 attention. 



I shall be very glad to have your book on Experimental 

 Evolution. I insisted on the necessity of obtaining ex- 

 perimental proof of the possibility of obtaining virtually 

 infertile breeds from a common stock in 1860 (in one of 

 the essays you have translated). Mr, Tegetmeier made a 

 number of experiments with pigeons some years ago, but 

 could obtain not the least approximation to infertility. 



From the first, I told Darwin this was the weak point 

 of his case from the point of view of scientific logic. But, 

 in this matter, we are just where we were thirty years 

 ago, and I am very glad you are going to call attention 

 to the subject. 



Sending a copy of the translation soon after to 

 Sir J. Hooker, he writes : — 



HonESLEA, Eastbourne, 

 Ja7i. 11, 1892. 



Mt dkar Hooker — We haA^e been in the middle of 

 snow for the last four days. I shall not venture to 

 London, and if you deserve the family title of the 

 "judicious," I don't think you will either. 



