2 THE DARWINIAN HYPOTHESIS i 



this simple word which may be culled from 

 authoritative sources ; and if, leaving terms and 

 theoretical subtleties aside, we turn to facts and 

 endeavour to gather a meaning for ourselves, by 

 studying the things to which, in practice, the 

 name of species is applied, it profits us little. For 

 practice varies as much as theory. Let two 

 botanists or two zoologists examine and describe 

 the productions of a country, and one will pretty 

 certainly disagree with the other as to the number, 

 limits, and definitions of the species into which he 

 groups the very same things. In these islands, we 

 are in the habit of regarding mankind as of one 

 species, but a fortnight's steam will land us in a 

 country where divines and savants, for once in 

 agreement, vie with one another in loudness of 

 assertion, if not in cogency of proof, that men are 

 of different species ; and, more particularly, that 

 the species negro is so distinct from our own that 

 the Ten Commandments have actually no reference 

 to him. Even in the calm region of entomology, 

 where, if anywhere in this sinful world, passion 

 and prejudice should fail to stir the mind, one 

 learned coleopterist will fill ten attractive volumes 

 with descriptions of species of beetles, nine-tenths 

 of which are immediately declared by his brother 

 beetle-mongers to be no species at all. 

 . The truth is that the number of distinguishable 

 living creatures almost surpasses imagination. At 

 least 100,000 such kinds of insects alone have been 



