THE EXCISED " MY'S." 241 



• 



the most favourable among variations that have been 

 induced mainly by function ; this, I have suflSciently 

 explained, is natural selection, though the words "natural 

 selection " are not employed ; but it is the true natural 

 selection which (if so metaphorical an expression is 

 allowed to pass) actually does take place with the 

 results ascribed to it by Lamarck, and not the false 

 Charles-Darwinian natural selection that does not 

 correspond with facts, and cannot result in specific 

 differences such as we now observe. But, waiving this, 

 the my's within which a little rift had begun to show 

 itself in 1866 might well become as mute in 1869, 

 as they could become without attracting attention, 

 when Mr. Darwin saw the passages just quoted, and 

 the hundred pages or so that lie between them. 



I suppose Mr. Darwin cut out the five more my's 

 that disappeared in 1872 because he had not yet 

 fully recovered from his scare, and allowed nine to 

 remain in order to cover his retreat, and tacitly say 

 that he had not done anything and knew nothing 

 whatever about it. Practically, indeed, he had not 

 retreated, and must have been well aware that he was 

 only retreating technically ; for he must have known 

 that the absence of acknowledgment to any earlier 

 writers in the body of his work, and the presence 

 of the many passages in which every word conveyed 

 the impression that the writer claimed descent with 

 modification, amounted to a claim as much when the 

 actual word " my " had been taken out as while it was 

 allowed to stand We took Mr. Darwin at his own 

 estimate because we could not for a moment suppose 



Q 



