MY LITERARY WORK 105 



concluded its short notice : " Every point is driven home with 

 vigour and directness, and the little book is well calculated to 

 assist in the formation of sound views upon the urgent ques- 

 tion of which it treats." The Beacon (Boston, U.S.A.) termed 

 it " a very important little book," and gave it a wholly favour- 

 able review; but the notice that pleased me most was that in 

 Knowledge, then edited by Richard Proctor, a man of origin- 

 ality and genius. He declared that my book was remarkable 

 as being the application of scientific method to a complex 

 problem of political economy, which, of course, rendered it 

 impossible for the official representatives of that science to 

 accept its conclusions. The book, however, had very little 

 sale, and after a few years the publishers sent me about a 

 hundred copies, which remained an incumbrance to their 

 shelves, and which I gave away. It is, therefore, at present, 

 one of the rarest of my books. In the same year I wrote my 

 best small contribution to the literature of anti-vaccination, 

 entitled " Forty-five Years of Registration Statistics, proving 

 Vaccination to be both Useless and Dangerous" ; but this sub- 

 ject will be referred to in a future chapter. 



Towards the close of the year I received an invitation 

 from the Lowell Institute of Boston, U.S.A., to deliver a 

 course of lectures in the autumn and winter of 1886. After 

 some consideration I accepted this, and began their prepara- 

 tion, taking for my subject those portions of the theory of 

 evolution with which I was most familiar. At this time I had 

 made the acquaintance of the Rev. J. G. Wood, the well-known 

 writer of many popular works on national history. He had 

 been twice on lecturing tours to America, and gave me some 

 useful information, besides recommending an agent he had 

 employed, and who had arranged lectures for him at various 

 schools and colleges. I had already lectured in many English 

 towns on the permanence of the great oceans, on oceanic and 

 continental islands, and on various problems of geographical 

 distribution. To these subjects I now added one on " The 

 Darwinian Theory," illustrated by a set of original diagrams 

 of variation. I also wrote three lectures on the " Colours of 

 Animals (and Plants)," dwelling especially on protective 



