398 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES. 



mind. Probably he felt more surprise than did Dr. Wyman 

 when notified, a few months afterward, of the choice of the 

 corporation. The exigencies of the botanic garden probably 

 overbore other considerations. I doubt if Dr. Wyman ever 

 had an envious feeling. Certain it is that no one welcomed 

 the new professor with truer cordiality, or proved himself a 

 more constant friend. 



In these days it is sure to be asked how an anatomist, phy- 

 siologist, and morphologist like Professor Wyman regarded 

 the most remarkable scientific movement of his time, the re- 

 vival and apparent prevalence of doctrines of evolution. As 

 might be expected, he was neither an advocate or an opponent. 

 He was not one of those persons who quickly make up their 

 minds, and announce their opinions, with a confidence in- 

 versely proportionate to their knowledge. He could consider 

 long, and hold his judgment in suspense. How well he could 

 do this appears from an early, and so far as I know, his only 

 published presentation of the topic, in a short review of 

 Owen's " Monograph of the Aye- Aye " (in Am. Journ. Sci- 

 ence, Sept., 1863) — the paper in which Professor Owen's 

 acceptance of evolution, but not of natural selection, was 

 promulgated. Dr. Wyman compares Owen's view with that 

 of Darwin (to whom he had already communicated interesting 

 and novel illustrations of the play of natural selection) ; and 

 he adds some acute remarks upon a rather earlier speculation 

 by Mr. Agassiz, in which the latter suggests that the species 

 of animals might have been created as eggs rather than as 

 adults. He states the case between the two general views 

 with perfect impartiality, and the bent of his own mind is 

 barely discernible. In due time he satisfied himself as to 

 which of them was the more probable, or, in any case, the 

 more fertile hypothesis* As to this I may venture to take the 

 liberty to repeat the substance of a conversation which I had 

 with him some time after the death of the lamented Agassiz, 

 and not long before his own. I report the substance only, 

 not the words. 



Agassiz repeated to me, he said, a remark made to him by 

 Humboldt, to the effect that Cuvier made a great mistake, 



