3O8 THE 'ORIGIN OF SPECIES.' [i860. 



armour. I see plainly that it will be a long uphill fight. 

 But think of Lyell's progress with Geology. One thing I 

 see most plainly, that without Lyell's, yours, Huxley's, and 

 Carpenter's aid, my book would have been a mere flash in 

 the pan. But if we all stick to it, we shall surely gain the 

 day. And I now see that the battle is worth fighting. I 

 deeply hope that you think so. Does Bentham progress 

 at all ? I do not know what to say about Oxford. * 

 I should like it much with you, but it must depend on 

 health. . . . 



Yours most affectionately, 



C. DARWIN 



C. Darwin to C. Lyell. 



Down, May iSth [1860]. 



MY DEAR LYELL, I send a letter from Asa Gray to show 

 how hotly the battle rages there. Also one from Wallace, 

 very just in his remarks, though too laudatory and too modest, 

 and how admirably free from envy or jealousy. He must be 

 a good fellow. Perhaps I will enclose a letter from Thomson 

 of Calcutta ; not that it is much, but Hooker thinks so highly 

 of him. . . . 



Henslow informs me that Sedgwickf and then Professor 

 Clarke [sic] J made a regular and savage onslaught on my 

 book lately at the Cambridge Philosophical Society, but 

 Henslow seems to have defended me well, and maintained 

 that the subject was a legitimate one for investigation. Since 



* His health prevented him from J The late William Clark, Pro- 

 going to Oxford for the meeting of fessor of Anatomy. My father 

 the British Association. seems to have misunderstood his 



f Sedgwick's address is given informant. I am assured by Mr. 



somewhat abbreviated in The J. W. Clark that his father (Prof. 



Cambridge Chronicle, May igth, Clark) did not support Sedgwick in 



1860. the attack. 



