xxiv] SIR CHARLES LYELL 433 



power to indicate a method by which, when the time for 

 legislation comes, the present institution may be replaced by 

 one that will be a great educational and moral power in every 

 part of our land. 



I do not remember when I first saw Sir Charles Lyell, 

 but I probably met him at some of the evening meetings of 

 the scientific societies. I first lunched with him in the 

 summer of 1863, and then met, for the first time, Lady Lyell 

 and Miss Arabella B. Buckley. Miss Buckley had become 

 Sir Charles's private secretary early in that year, and she 

 informs me that she remembers this visit because Lady 

 Lyell gave her impressions of me afterwards — I am afraid 

 not very favourable ones, as I was shy, awkward, and quite 

 unused to good society. With Sir Charles I soon felt at 

 home, owing to his refined and gentle manners, his fund of 

 quiet humour, and his intense love and extensive knowledge 

 of natural science. His great liberality of thought and wide 

 general interests were also attractive to me ; and although 

 when he had once arrived at a definite conclusion he held 

 by it very tenaciously until a considerable body of well- 

 ascertained facts could be adduced against it, yet he was 

 always willing to listen to the arguments of his opponents, 

 and to give them careful and repeated consideration. This 

 was well shown in the time and trouble he gave to the 

 discussion with myself as to the glacial origin of the larger 

 alpine lake basins, writing me one letter of thirty pages 

 on the subject. Considering his position as the greatest 

 living authority on physical geology, it certainly showed 

 remarkable open-mindedness that he should condescend to 

 discuss the subject with such a mere amateur and tyro as 

 I then was. The theory was, however, too new and too 

 revolutionary for him to make up his mind at once, but he 

 certainly was somewhat influenced by the facts and arguments 

 I set before him, as shown by the expressions in his corre- 

 spondence with Darwin, which I have quoted. 



In the much vaster and more important problem of the 

 development of man from the lower animals, though convinced 



VOL. I. 2 F 



