FRENCH TRANSLATIONS OF HIS WORKS 



309 



As to the new volume you shall have the refusal of it if you 

 care to have it. But I have my doubts about its acceptability to 

 a French public which I imagine knows little about Bibliolatry 

 and the ways of Protestant clericalism, and cares less. 



These essays represent a controversy which has been going 

 on for five or six years about Genesis, the deluge, the miracle 

 of the herd of swine, and the miraculous generally, between 

 Gladstone, the ecclesiastical principal of King's College, various 

 bishops, the writer of Lux Mundi, that spoilt Scotch minister 

 the Duke of Argyll, and myself. 



My object has been to stir up my countrymen to think about 

 these things ; and the only use of controversy is that it appeals 

 to their love of fighting, and secures their attention. 



I shall be very glad to'have your book on Experimental Evo- 

 lution. I insisted on the necessity of obtaining experimental 

 proof of the possibility of obtaining virtually infertile breeds 

 from a common stock in i860 (in one of the essays you have 

 translated). Mr. Tegetmeier made a number of experiments 

 with pigeons some years ago, but could obtain not the least ap- 

 proximation to infertility. 



From the first, I told Darwin this was the weak point of his 

 case from the point of view of scientific logic. But, in this 

 matter, we are just where we were thirty years ago, and I am 

 very glad you are going to call attention to the subject. 



Sending a copy of the translation soon after to Sir J. 

 Hooker, he writes : — 



Hodeslea, Eastbourne, Jan. 11, 1892. 



My dear Hooker — We have been in the middle of snow for 

 the last foui days. I shall not venture to London, and if you 

 deserve the family title of the " judicious," I don't think you will 

 either. 



I send you by this post a volume of the French translation 

 of a collection of my essays about Darwinism and Evolution, 

 1860-76, foi which I have written a brief preface. I was really 

 proud of myself wnen I discovered on re-reading them that I 

 had nothing to alter. 



What times those days were ! Fuimus ! — Ever yours affec- 

 tionately, T. H. Huxley. 



The same subject of experimental evolution reappears 

 in a letter to Professor Romanes of April 29. A project 

 was on foot for founding an institution in which experi- 



