20 



itself to be a more adequate expression of the universal order of things 

 than any of the schemes which have been accepted by the credulity and 

 welcomed by the superstition of seventy later generations of men." Huxley, 

 1887. 



Dec. 26. Publication of Huxley's celebrated review of the Origin in 

 the Times. 



" Have you seen the splendid essay and notice of my book in the 

 Times? I cannot avoid a strong suspicion that it is by Huxley — It will 

 do grand service." C. Darwin to J. D. Hooker, 1859. 



i860 Publication of the second edition of the Origin (3000 copies). 



Publication of a Naturalist 's Voyage. 



June 28. Pitched battle over the Origin at the Oxford meeting of the 

 British Association. Defeat of the Bishop of Oxford by Huxley. 



"On the whole... the supporters of Mr Darwin's views in i860 were 

 numerically extremely insignificant. There is not the slightest doubt that, 

 if a general council of the Church scientific had been held at that time, 

 we should have been condemned by an overwhelming majority." Huxley, 

 1887. 



1861 Publication of the third edition of the Origin (2000 copies). 



1862 Publication of the book On the various contrivances by which Orchids 

 are fertilised by Insects. 



" Another favourite place was ' Orchis Bank,' above the quiet Cudham 

 valley, where fly- and musk-orchids grew among the junipers, and Cephal- 

 anthera and Neottia under the beech boughs." 



1864 Received the Copley Medal, the highest honour which the Royal 



Society can confer. 



" Some old members of the Royal are quite shocked at my having the 

 Copley." 



That such a feeling existed is clear from the action of the Council in 

 pointedly omitting from the grounds of their award the theory set forth in 

 the Origin. That this book could within five years of its publication be 

 valued by the Royal Society merely as a "mass of observations, etc.," is 

 striking evidence of the slow progress of Evolution. It may perhaps be 

 said that 1870 is the date at which the current of scientific opinion is seen 

 to be definitely flowing in the direction of Evolution: and 1880 the time 

 by which it had reached its full volume. Mr Huxley wrote in 1880: 



