1860.] BRITISH ASSOCIATION. n y 



wrong, and that was right when he said the whole subject 



would be forgotten in ten years ; but now that I hear that you 

 and Huxley will fight publicly (which I am sure I never 

 could do), I fully believe that our cause will, in the long- 

 run, prevail. I am glad I was not in Oxford, for I should 

 have been overwhelmed, with my [health] in its present state. 



C. Darwin to T. H. Huxley. 



Sudbrook Park, Richmond, 



July 3rd (1860). 



.... I had a letter from Oxford, written by Hooker late 

 on Sunday night, giving me some account of the awful battles 

 which have raged about species at Oxford. He tells me you 

 fought nobly with Owen (but I have heard no particulars), 

 and that you answered the B. of O. capitally. I often think 

 that my friends (and you far beyond others) have good cause 

 to hate me, for having stirred up so much mud, and led them 

 into so much odious trouble. If I had been a friend of 

 myself, I should have hated me. (How to make that sentence 

 good English, I know not.) But remember, if I had not 

 stirred up the mud, some one else certainly soon would. I 

 honour your pluck ; I would as soon have died as tried to 

 answer the Bishop in such an assembly. . . . 



[On July 2oth, my father wrote to Mr. Huxley : 



" From all that I hear from several quarters, it seems that 

 Oxford did the subject great good. It is of enormous im- 

 portance, the showing the world that a few first-rate men are 

 not afraid of expressing their opinion."] 



C. Darwin to /. D. Hooker. 



[July i860.] 



.... I have just read the ' Quarterly.' * It is uncom- 

 monly clever ; it picks out with skill all the most conjectural 



* ' Quarterly Review,' July 1860. The article in question was by Wil- 

 berforce, Bishop of Oxford, and was afterwards published in his " Essays 



