1863.] 'ANTIQUITY OF MAN.* j^ 



would have been an epoch in the subject. All that is over 

 with me, and I will only think on the admirable skill with 

 which you have selected the striking points, and explained 

 them. No praise can be too strong, in my opinion, for the 

 inimitable chapter on language in comparison with species. 



* P- 55~~A sentence at the top of the page makes me 

 groan. . . . 



I know you will forgive me for writing with perfect freedom, 

 for you must know how deeply I respect you as my old 

 honoured guide and master. I heartily hope and expect that 

 your book will have gigantic circulation and may do in many 

 ways as much good as it ought to do. I am tired, so no more. 

 I have written so briefly that you will have to guess my 

 meaning. I fear my remarks are hardly worth sending. 

 Farewell, with kindest remembrance to Lady Lyell. 



Ever yours, 



C. DARWIN. 



[Mr. Huxley has quoted (vol. i. p. 546) some passages from 

 Lyell's letters which show his state of mind at this time. The 

 following passage, from a letter of March nth to my father, 

 is also of much interest : 



"My feelings, however, more than any thought about 

 policy or expediency, prevent me from dogmatising as to 

 the descent of man from the brutes, which, though I am 

 prepared to accept it, takes away much of the charm from 

 my speculations on the past relating to such matters. . . . 

 But you ought to be satisfied, as I shall bring hundreds 

 towards you who, if I treated the matter more dogmatically, 

 would have rebelled."] 



* After speculating on the sudden appearance of individuals far above 

 the average of the human race, Lyell asks if such leaps upwards in the 

 scale of intellect may not "have cleared at one bound the space which 

 separated the higher stage of the unprogressive intelligence of the inferior 

 animals from the first and lowest form of improvable reason manifested by 

 man." 



