1872.] FRENCH ACADEMY. 15$ 



I am gratified to hear that M. Lacaze-Duthiers will vote 

 for me,* for I have long honoured his name. I cannot help 

 regretting that you should expend your valuable time in 

 trying to obtain for me the honour of election, for I fear, 

 judging from the last time, that all your labour will be in vain. 

 Whatever the result may be, I shall always retain the most 

 lively recollection of your sympathy and kindness, and this 

 will quite console me for my rejection. 



With much respect and esteem, I remain, dear Sir, 



Yours truly obliged, 

 CHARLES DARWIN. 



P. S. With respect to the great stress which you lay on 

 man walking on two legs, whilst the quadrumana go on all 

 fours, permit me to remind you that no one much values the 

 great difference in the mode of locomotion, and consequently 

 in structure, between seals and the terrestrial carnivora, or 

 between the almost biped kangaroos and other marsupials. 



C. Darwin to August Weismann.\ 



Down, April 5, 1872. 



MY DEAR SIR, I have now read your essay \ with very 

 great interest. Your view of the origin of local races 

 through "Amixie," is altogether new to me, and seems to 

 throw an important light on an obscure problem. There is, 

 however, something strange about the periods or endurance 

 of variability. I formerly endeavoured to investigate the 

 subject, not by looking to past time, but to species of the 

 same genus widely distributed ; and I found in many cases 

 that all the species, with perhaps one or two exceptions, were 

 variable. It would be a very interesting subject for a con- 



* He was not elected as a cor- % * Ueber den Einfluss der Iso- 



responding member of the French lining auf die Artbildung.' Leipzig, 



Academy until 1878. 1872. 



f Professor of Zoology in Freiburg. 



