FIFTY YEARS OF DARWINISM 31 



his anonymous article in the Edinburgh Review 

 for April, 1860. But Owen could not bear to 

 remain apart from the stream of thought when 

 there was no doubt about the way it was flowing, 

 so that in a few years he was maintaining some 

 of the chief conclusions of the Origin, although 

 retracting nothing, but rather keeping up his bit- 

 ter attacks upon Darwin. This treatment re- 

 ceived from one who was all affability ^ when they 

 met was naturally resented by Darwin, whose 

 feelings on the subject are expressed in the fol- 

 lowing passage from a letter to Asa Gray,^ July 

 23,1862:— 



" By the way, one of my chief enemies (the sole one 

 who has annoyed me), namely Owen, I hear has been 

 lecturing on birds; and admits that all have descended 

 from one, and advances as his own idea that the oceanic 

 wingless birds have lost their wings by gradueil disuse. 

 He never alludes to me, or only with bitter sneers, and 

 coupled with Buffon and the Vestiges." 



In the historical sketch added to the later edi- 

 tions of the Origin, Owen is the only writer who 

 is severely dealt with. In this introductory sec- 

 tion Darwin said that he was unable to decide 

 whether Owen did or did not claim to have orig- 

 inated the theory of Natural Selection.^ 



About twelve years after the appearance of 

 the Origin another opponent, St. George Mivart, 



' " Mrs. Carlyle said that Owen's sweetness always reminded 

 her of sugar of lead." Life and Letters of T. H. 

 London, II, p. 167. 



' More Letters, I, p. 203. 



' Origin of Species, 6th ed., p. xviii. 



