ON THE OENETIC VIEW OF NATURE. 339 



the older division of zoology and botany having to a 

 large extent been removed by a study of the inter- 

 dependence of the many forms of living things and 

 their connection with peculiarities of climate and soil. 

 The Darwinian attitude to the study of natural objects 

 has also introduced 'into the natural sciences the exact 

 spirit of research, — accurate measurements, together with 

 elaborate countings, being resorted to in order to decide 

 the range of variability of species, the rate of increase 

 in numbers, and the proportion of the surviving to the 

 lost or wasted specimens. A large amount of statistical 

 information ^ has tlius Ijeen accumulated, and natural 

 history is becoming to some extent an exact science. 

 That it will ever Ije so to a very large extent is doubt- 

 ful : it is one of the great merits of Darwin that he has 

 introduced a special method into the sciences of nature — 

 ihe method of a judicious balancing of evidence. He ss. 

 was fully " aware that scarcely a single point was dis- method, 

 cussed in his works on which facts cannot be adduced, 

 often apparently leading to conclusions directly opposite 

 to those at which he arrived, and that a fair result can be 

 obtained only by fully stating and l»alancing the facts 



natural selection, and must, there- served as one of the most valuable 



fore, find its explanation in tlie illu.strations and proofs of the 

 jjrinciple uf adaptation or utility " ' theory of natural selection. The 



(Wallace, 'Darwinism,' p. 189). whole matter is admirably ex- 



Tlie term "Mimicry" was first pounded by Mr Wallace in his 



introduced by H. \V. Bates in his long article in the ' Westminster 



paper on " Mimetic Butterflies," Review,' July 1867, reprinted in 



road befoie the Linnwan Soc, Nov. 

 l>tjl, and hailed by Darwin ('Life,' 



his ' Contributions to the Theory 

 of Natural Selection ' (1870, pp. 45- 



vol. ii. p. 'i'j'2) as "one of the most ] 129), and again in 'Darwinism, 



remarkable and admirable pa])ers " j ^ On the development ><{ sUitis- 



he ever read. Tiie .'subject had | tical methods in the service of the 



been passed over in the first editions i theory of evolution, see chap. xii. 



of the ' Origin,' but was introduced below, 

 in later edition-^, and has always 



