146 



NA TURE 



[December 14, 1905 



The " Life " contains many interesting appre- 

 ciations of other naturalists, but we must confine our- 

 selves to the relations between Darwin and the author. 

 From his solitude in Malay Wallace wrote home in 

 regard to " The Origin of Species " : — 



" 1 have read it through five or six times, each 

 time with increasing admiration. It will live as 

 long as the Principia of Newton. Mr. Darwin 

 has given the world a new Science, and his name 

 should, in my opinion, stand above that of every 

 philosopher of ancient and modern times." 



To Mr. Bates he wrote : — 



"I do honestly believe that with however much 

 patience 1 had worked and experimented on the sub- 

 ject, I could never have approached the completeness 

 of his book, its vast accumulation of evidence, its over- 

 whelming argument, and its admirable tone and 

 spirit. I really feel thankful that it has not been left 

 to me to give the theory to the world." 



As everyone knows, Wallace parted company with 

 Darwin over the possibility of giving a " natural his- 

 tory " interpretation of man's highest qualities, and in 

 one of his letters Darwin expressed the fear that 

 his selectionist interpretation would quite kill him in 

 Wallace's good estimation. But the author writes : — 



" I never had the slightest feeling of the kind he 

 supposed, looking upon the difference as one which 

 did not at all affect our general agreement, and also 

 being one on which no one could dogmatise, there 

 being much to be said on both sides." 



Wallace also differed from Darwin in regard to the 

 reality of sexual selection through female choice, as 

 to the distribution of Arctic plants in south temperate 

 regions, as to the feasibility of the provisional hypo- 

 thesis of pangenesis, and as to the transmissibility of 

 acquired character. On the whole, however, he 

 admits that those critics are not far wrong who de- 

 scribe him as more Darwinian than Darwin, and 

 even in the title of one of his most effective books he 

 persisted in his magnanimous subordination of him- 

 self. The fact is, the friends were too keen in the pur- 

 suit of truth to trouble about the boundaries of their 

 personal credit. Neither begrudged the other his due 

 meed of praise. Thus, if we may quote once more, 

 we find Darwin writing to Wallace : — 



" I hope it is a satisfaction to you to reflect — and 

 very few things in my life have been more satisfac- 

 tory to me — that we have never felt any jealousy to- 

 wards each other, though in some sense rivals. I 

 believe I can say this of myself with truth, and I am 

 absolutely sure that it is true of you." 



In addition to his statement of the theory of 

 natural selection, his travels, and his work on distri- 

 bution, Mr. Wallace has in many ways enriched 

 natural history in the wide sense. There is his theory 

 of the " warning colours " of inedible insects, his 

 theory of the correlation between the colours of female 

 birds and the nature of the nest, his theory of " re- 

 cognition-marks," his criticism of sexual selection by 

 choice on the female's part, his argument that much 

 that is called " instinctive " is due to instruction and 

 imitation, his conclusions as to the Arctic elements 

 in south temperate floras, his emphasis on mouth- 

 gesture as a factor in the origin of language, his 

 NO. 1885, VOL. J 3} 



strong opinions as to the part natural selection has 

 played and still plays in the social evolution of 

 mankind. We might mention other contributions — 

 as to the permanence of oceanic and continental 

 areas, as to the causes of glacial epochs, as to the 

 gla< ial erosion of lake-basins, as to the affinities of 

 the Australian aborigines — but we have said enough. 

 It may be of interest, however, to notice that while 

 Wallace many years ago sided with Weismann, he 

 cannot see his way to recognise the validity of the 

 recent theories of discontinuous variation and muta- 

 tion. 



In thinking of the work of Alfred Russel Wallace, 

 we see him as a " synthetic type," combining the vir- 

 tues of the old naturalist traveller with those of the 

 modern biologist. On the one hand, we see him with 

 a rich experience of the forms and species of animal 

 life, their distribution, habits, and inter-relations, but 

 with a wide outlook, equally interested in palms and 

 orchids, lakes and mountains. With " a positive dis- 

 taste for all forms of anatomical and physiological 

 experiment," he never took to any of the usual 

 methods of analysis, and even when he was most pre- 

 occupied with species he tells us that he was deter- 

 mined not to become a specialist. So, on the other 

 hand, we see him from first to last as a generaliser, 

 " inquisitive about causes," intent upon " solving the 

 problem of the origin of species," and contributing 

 much thereto. His " Life " also discloses what many 

 have had the privilege of knowing — the delightful per- 

 sonality of one who has had the honour of being 

 " Darwinii asmulum, immo Darwinium alterum," 

 and no astiologist merely, but a warm-hearted 

 humanist thinker, a fearless social striver, and one 

 who realises the spiritual aspect of the world. He 

 has the satisfaction of a retrospect on a long and 

 happy life of work. J. A. T. 



A HIGHER TEXT-BOOK OF ELECTRICITY 

 AND MAGNETISM. 

 Magnetism and Electricity for Students, by H. E. 

 Hadley. Pp. x + 575. (London: Macmillan and 

 Co., Ltd., 1905.) Price 6s. 

 T"'HE object of this volume is to carry students a 

 -*- stage further than that reached in the author's 

 "Magnetism and Electricity for Beginners." It has 

 been written in response to numerous requests from 

 teachers. Its scope is roughly that of a second- cr 

 even third-year college course. Elementary differ- 

 ential and integral calculus is employed, but even 

 this is avoided whenever reasonably practicable. 

 Technical applications are dealt with in a minor way 

 only, the author considering, rightly in our opinion, 

 that they are best relegated to a special treatise. 



Turning to the detailed treatment we find many 

 things to attract us. The method adopted for de- 

 scribing electrical phenomena may be alluded to as 

 the "lines of force method." There are a large 

 number of carefully thought out diagrams showing 

 the play of Faraday tubes in various cases. These 

 are in the main very accurate and suggestive as 

 sketch diagrams. In Fig. 112, however — illustrative 



