Alfred Russel Wallace 



with what Matthieu Williams's theory requires. The 

 author is a practical chemist engaged in iron manufac- 

 ture, and it is from furnace chemistry that he has been 

 led to the subject. I think it the most original, most 

 thoughtful and most carefully-worked-out theory that has 

 appeared for a long time, and it does not say much for 

 the critics that, as far as I know, its great merits have not 

 been properly recognised. 



I have been so fully occupied with road-making, well- 

 digging, garden- and house-planning, planting, etc., that I 

 have given up all other work. 



Do you not admire our friend Miss Buckley's admirable 

 article in Macmillan ? It seems to me the best and most 

 original that has been written on your book. 



Hoping you are well, and are not working too hard, I 

 remain yours very faithfully, Alfred K. Wallace. 



Down, Beckenham, Kent. July 9, 1871. 



My dear Wallace, — I send by this post a review by 

 Chauncey Wright, as I much want your opinion of it, as 

 soon as you can send it. I consider you an incomparably 

 better critic than I am. The article, though not very clearly 

 written, and poor in parts for want of knowledge, seems to 

 me admirable. 



Mivart's book is producing a great effect against Natural 

 Selection, and more especially against me. Therefore, if 

 you think the article even somewhat good, I will write and 

 get permission to publish it as a shilling pamphlet, together 

 with the MS. addition (enclosed), for which there was not 

 room at the end of the review. I do not suppose I should 

 lose more than £20 or £30. 



I am now at work at a new and cheap edition of the 

 ^' Origin," and shall answer several points in Mivart's book 

 and introduce a new chapter for this purpose; but I treat 



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