The Wallace-Darwin Correspondence 



I shall be intensely curious to see your article in the 

 Journal of Travel. 



Many thanks for such answers as you could give. From 

 what you say I should have inferred that birds of paradise 

 were probably polygamous. But after all, perhaps it is 

 not so important as I thought. I have been going through 

 the whole animal kingdom in reference to sexual selection, 

 and I have just got to the beginning of Lepidoptera, i.e. to 

 end of insects, and shall then pass on to Vertebrata. But 

 my ladies next week are going (ill-luck to it) to take me 

 nolens- volens to London for a whole month. 



I suspect Owen wrote the article in the Atlienwum, but 

 I have been told that it is Berthold Seeman. The writer 

 despises and hates me. 



Hearty thanks for your letter — you have indeed pleased 

 me, for I had given up the great god Pan as a stillborn 

 deity. I wish you could be induced to make it clear with 

 your admirable powers of elucidation in one of thidlicien- 

 tific journals. 



I think we almost entirely agree about sexual selection, 

 as I now follow you to large extent about protection to 

 females, having always believed that colour was often trans- 

 mitted to both sexes; but I do not go quite so far about 

 protection.— Always yours most sincerely, q^^ Darwin. 



Hurstpier point. March 1, 1868. 



My dear Darwin, — I beg to enclose what appears to me 

 a demonstration, on your own principles ^ that Natural Selec- 

 tion could produce sterility of hybrids. 



If it does not convince you I shall be glad if you will 

 point out where the fallacy lies. I have taken the two cases 

 of a slight sterility overcoming a perfect fertility, and of 

 a perfect sterility overcoming a partial fertility — the begin- 

 ning and end of the process. You admit that variations 



199 



