Alfred Russel Wallace 



starting-point of a new life was clearly in his mind ; while 

 Darwin simply accepted the opportunity when it came, 

 and was only brought to a consciousness of its full mean- 

 ing and bearing on his future career whilst studying the 

 geological aspect of Santiago when '' the line of white 

 rock revealed a new and important fact/' namely, that 

 there had been afterwards subsidence round the craters, 

 which had since been in action and had poured forth 

 lava. ^' It then," he says, *' first dawned on me that I 

 might perhaps write a book on the geology of the various 

 countries visited, and this made me thrill with delight. 

 That was a memorable hour to me; and how distinctly I 

 can call to mind the low cliff of lava, beneath which I 

 rested, with the sun glaring hot, a few strange desert 

 plants growing near, and with living corals in the tidal 

 pools at my feet ! ''' 



Another point of comparison lies in the fact that at no 

 time did the study of man or human nature, from the meta- 

 physical and psychological point of view, appeal to Darwin 

 as it did to Wallace ; and this being so, the similarity between 

 the impression made on them individually by their first con- 

 tact with primitive human beings is of some interest. 



Wallace's words have already been quoted; here are 

 Darwin's : '' Nothing is more certain to create astonish- 

 ment than the first sight in his native haunt of a bar- 

 barian, of man in his lowest and most savage state. One 

 asks : ^ Could our progenitors have been men like these 

 — men whose very signs and expressions are less intelli- 

 gible to us than those of the domesticated animals; men 

 who do not possess the instinct of those animals, nor yet 

 appear to boast of human reason, or at least of arts con- 

 sequent on that reason ? ' I do not believe it is possible 

 to describe or paint the difference between a savage and 



1 "Life of Charles Darwin" (one-volume Edit.), p. 29, 

 34 



