D.—ZOOLOGY. 3 
possible the great encounter at Oxford in 1860; for when Huxley told 
him that he did not mean to attend the meeting of the Section on 
June 30—‘ did not see the good of giving up peace and quietness to be 
episcopally pounded,’ ‘ Chambers broke into vehement remonstrances, and 
talked about my deserting them. So I said, “Oh! if you are going to 
take it that way, I’ll come and have my share of what is going on.” ’ 
And after the meeting, J. R. Green wrote to his College friend, Boyd 
Dawkins—‘ I was introduced to Robert Chambers the other day and 
heard him chuckle over the episcopal defeat.’ 
Owing to the kindness of Lady Boyd Dawkins and Dr. Leonard 
Huxley, I am able to print a very interesting and hitherto unpublished 
letter in which Huxley confirmed the well-known description of the 
debate given by Green :— 
“4 Marlborough Place, 
‘ Abbey Road, N.W. 
‘ June 11, 1883. 
‘ My dear Boyd Dawkins, 
‘Many thanks for the extract from Green’s letter. His account of the 
matter appears to me to be accurate in all essentials, though, of course, 
I cannot be sure of the exact words that were used on either side. 
‘It is curious that your letter should have reached me this morning, 
when in a couple of hours I shall start for Cambridge for the purpose of 
delivering the Rede Lecture on the subject of “ Evolution.” I should 
not have chosen this topic of my own mere motion. But I found that 
nothing else would satisfy the expectations of Cambridge! Truly “ the 
whirligig of time brings its revenges.” 
‘lam, 
* Yours very sincerely, 
) PAE oxy” 
Robert Chambers’ work appears to have provided the stimulus which 
led to the preparation of an interesting and surprising manuscript* by the 
younger J. Searles Wood. It was found by my friend, Sir Sidney Harmer, 
among his father’s papers, and bears a note, dated 1866 and signed 
J.S.W. Jr., stating that it ‘ was written about 1848 or 1849 and the pencil 
alterations made at the time.’ The paper, however, bearing a water-mark 
of 1850, supplies a rather comforting correction, for the author was not 
born until 1830, and at eighteen or nineteen must have been a very pre- 
cocious youth to have written such a manuscript. Searles Wood, who 
was a great admirer of Lamarck, was evidently stirred by the immense 
success of the Vestiges and doubtless especially by the statement that the 
hypothesis of the French naturalist ‘deservedly incurred much ridicule, 
although it contained a glimmer of truth.’ The manuscript is, however, 
far more than a defence of Lamarck: it contains powerful arguments in 
favour of evolution, based upon the very grounds which convinced Darwin 
himself—the ‘ wonderful relationship in the same continent between the 
2 Presented by Sir Sidney Harmer, F.R.S., to the Linnean Society of London. 
It is hoped that the manuscript will be published in the Proceedings of the Society 
when the rather difficult task of editing has been completed. 
