ANNALS NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES 
37 
In 1867 Hyatt’s paper on “Parallelism” appeared. This I believe to 
be the first distinctly evolutionary contribution from the zoological side. 
In this year, 1867, Professor Newberry, later and for twenty-three years the 
president of this academy, delivered his address at the Burlington meeting 
of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, betraying in 
this a singular nobleness of character toward those to whose advanced views 
he felt that the scientific world could not entirely subscribe, and admirably 
illustrating what he interpreted to be the prevailing opinion as shown by the 
following quotation: 
Although this Darwinian hypothesis is looked upon by many as striking at the 
root of all vital faith, and is the bete noire of all those good men who deplore and con¬ 
demn the materialistic tendency of modern science, still the purity of life of the 
author of the “Origin of Species,” his enthusiastic devotion to the study of truth, 
the industry and acumen which have marked his researches, the candor and caution 
with which his suggestions have been made, all combine to render the obloquy and 
scorn with which they have been received in many quarters, peculiarly unjust and 
in bad taste. 
This was also the first year of the American Naturalist, edited by those 
four pupils of Agassiz — Packard, Morse, Hyatt and Putnam — of whom 
two are still spared. The introduction of the charming first volume of this 
characteristic American publication is sufficient proof that at the time of its 
issue even the younger men felt that there were two distinct schools of thought 
relative to the “Origin of Species.” Those who are familiar with the in¬ 
troduction will remember that it is illuminated with one of Morse’s inimitable 
sketches, a snail peering through a binocular microscope, symbolical, doubt¬ 
less, of the slowness of perception of those who clung to this archaic instru¬ 
ment and possibly also of those who clung to archaic ideas. 
The following year, 1868, the Academy of Natural Sciences of Phila¬ 
delphia, which in 1860 had elected Darwin to membership, published the 
first important direct contribution to the subject of evolution made by one 
not directly under the influence of the Boston academies. This contribution, 
“On the Origin of Genera,” was made by Cope, who for several years had 
been submitting papers to the academy of a descriptive and semi-speculative 
character, and largely dealing with the classification of reptiles. I believe 
that I am perfectly safe in saying that no academy in America has ever 
published a paper that reflects more to its credit than this extraordinary 
essay of Cope. It is apologetically issued as a fragment, but in it there is 
shown an intimate acquaintance with anatomical detail that is almost super¬ 
natural, an independence of thought that is extraordinary, a power of analysis 
that stuns the reader, an estimate of the weak and the strong points of the 
Darwinian theory that is masterly, an agility of logic that marked its author 
