244 THE FOUNDATIONS OF ZOOLOGY 



which would occur among the first few and scattered inhabitants 

 of the middle regions of Africa, some one would be better fitted 

 than the others to bear the diseases of the country. This race 

 would consequently multiply, while the others would decrease, 

 not only from their inability to sustain the attacks of disease but 

 from their incapacity to contend with their more vigorous neigh- 

 bors. The color of this vigorous race would be black for the 

 reason given. The same disposition to form varieties still existing, 

 a darker and a darker race would in course of time occur; and 

 as the darkest would be the best fitted for the climate, this would 

 at length become the most prevalent if not the only race in the 

 particular country in which it had originated. 



It is sometimes said that the success of the " Origin," and 

 the independent enunciation of its central conception by so many 

 thinkers, proved that the subject was in the air, or that men's 

 minds were prepared for it; but Darwin says he does not think 

 this was strictly true ; for while he occasionally sounded not a few 

 naturalists, he never happened to come across a single one who 

 seemed to doubt about the permanency of species. Even Lyell 

 and Hooker, though they would listen with interest, never seemed 

 to agree. He says that he tried once or twice to explain to able 

 men what he meant by Natural Selection, but signally failed; 

 and Huxley bears witness, as do others, that the sentiment of 

 the most profound naturalists was critical rather than sympathetic. 



Darwin tells us the publication in 1858 of Mr. Wallace's 

 clever and admirably expressed essay, together with an abstract 

 from his own notes, " excited very little attention, and the only 

 published notice of them which I can remember was by Profes- 

 sor Houghton of Dublin, whose verdict was that all that was new 

 in them was false, and that what was true was old." 



Darwin has himself tried to analyze the mental qualities and 

 conditions on which his success has depended ; and he is no 

 doubt right in attributing much of his success as an investigator 

 and much of his influence upon scientific thought to the indefati- 

 gable industry which is so clearly shown in all his works ; and 

 the success of the " Origin " was no doubt due to its vast array 

 of demonstrated facts, rather than to the way in which the argu- 

 ment was stated ; but Lamarck was also an earnest, simple- 



