342 • 'DESCENT OF MAN '—EXPRESSION. [1872. 



lire in man is of much weight ; C. Vogt, indeed, argues that 

 [the existence of] Micro-cephalous idiots is a case of rever- 

 sion. No one who believes in Evolution will doubt that the 

 Phocae are descended from some terrestrial Carnivore. Yet 

 no one would expect to meet with any such reversion in 

 them. The lesser divergence of character in the races of 

 man in comparison with the species of Simiadae may perhaps 

 be accounted for by man having spread over the world at a 

 much later period than did the Simiadae. I am fully pre- 

 pared to admit the high antiquity of man ; but then we have 

 evidence, in the Dryopithecus, of the high antiquity of the 

 Anthropomorphous Simiae. 



I am glad to hear that you are at work on your fossil 

 plants, which of late years have afforded so rich a field for 

 discovery. With my best thanks for your great kindness, 

 and with much respect, I remain, 



Dear Sir, yours very faithfully, 



Charles Darwin. 



[In April, 1872, he was elected to the Royal Society of 

 Holland, and wrote to Professor Donders : — 



" Very many thanks for your letter. The honour of being 

 elected a foreign member of your Royal Society has pleased 

 me much. The sympathy of his fellow workers has always 

 appeared to me by far the highest reward to which any 

 scientific man can look. My gratification has been not a 

 little increased by first hearing of the honour from you."] 



C. Darwin to Chauncey Wright. 



Down, June 3, 1872. 

 My dear Sir, — Many thanks for your article * in the 

 ' North American Review,' which I have read with great 



* The proof-sheets of an article which appeared in the July number of 

 the ' North American Review.' It was a rejoinder to Mr. Mivart's reply 

 (' N. Am. Review,' April 1872) to Mr. Chauncey Wright's pamphlet. 

 Chauncey Wright says of it (' Letters,' p. 238) : — " It is not properly a re- 

 joinder but a new article, repeating and expounding some of the points of 

 my pamphlet, and answering some of Mr. Mivart's replies incidentally." 



