9o PROFESSOR OWEN ch. in. 



following note written to Lyell, which is included 

 by Francis Darwin in his ' Life ' of his father : — 



' How curious I shall be to know what line 

 Owen will take ! Dead against us, I fear ; but he 

 wrote me a most liberal note on the reception of 

 my book, and said he was quite prepared to 

 answer fairly, and without prejudice, my line of 

 argument' 



After a meeting with Owen, Darwin writes 

 him the following interesting letter respecting the 

 ' Origin :' — 



Down, Bromley, Kent: December 13 (1859). 



' Dear Owen, — ... You made a remark in 

 our conversation something to the effect that my 

 book could not probably be true as it attempted 

 to explain so much. I can only answer that this 

 might be objected to any view embracing two or 

 three classes of facts. Yet I assure you that its 

 truth has often and often weighed heavily on me ; 

 and I have thought that perhaps my book might 

 be a case like Macleay's quinary system. 8 So 

 strongly did I feel this that I resolved to give 

 it all up, as far as I could, if I did not convince 

 at least two or three competent judges. You 

 smiled at me for sticking myself up as a martyr ; 

 but I assure you if you had heard the unmerciful 

 and, I think, unjust things said of my book and to 



8 ' An artificial attempt at a among naturalists.' — Did. Nat. 

 natural system of classification Biogr. 

 which soon became a byword 



