| CHAPTER | PAGE | |
| I.— | The Secret of Darwin’s Greatness | [9] |
| II.— | Boyhood—Edinburgh—Cambridge (1817–31) | [16] |
| III.— | Voyage of the “Beagle” (1831–36) | [21] |
| IV.— | Cambridge—London—Work upon the Collections—Marriage—Geological Work—Journal of the Voyage—Coral Reefs—First Recorded Thoughts on Evolution (1837–42) | [25] |
| V.— | Down—Geology of the Voyage—Work on Cirripedes (1842–54) | [35] |
| VI.— | The Growth of the “Origin of Species” (1837–58) | [42] |
| VII.— | Growth of the “Origin” (continued)—Correspondence with Friends | [50] |
| VIII.— | Darwin and Wallace (1858) | [60] |
| IX.— | Darwin’s Section of the Joint Memoir read before the Linnean Society July 1, 1858 | [65] |
| X.— | Wallace’s Section of the Joint Memoir read before the Linnean Society July 1, 1858 | [71] |
| XI.— | Comparison of Darwin’s and Wallace’s Sections of the Joint Memoir—Reception of their Views—Their Friendship | [78] |
| XII.— | The Growth of Wallace’s Convictions on Evolution and Discovery of Natural Selection—Borneo 1855—Ternate 1858 | [87] |
| XIII.— | Canon Tristram the First Publicly to Accept the Theory of Natural Selection (1859) | [92] |
| XIV.— | The Preparation of the “Origin of Species” (1858–59) | [95] |
| XV.— | The Origin of Species (1859) | [100] |
| XVI.— | The Influence of Darwin upon Lyell (1859–64) | [105] |
| XVII.— | Influence of Darwin upon Hooker and Asa Gray—Natural Selection and Design in Nature (1860–68) | [111] |
| XVIII.— | Influence of Darwin upon Huxley | [119] |
| XIX.— | The Difficulty with which the “Origin” was Understood | [144] |
| XX.— | The Difficulty with which the “Origin” was Understood (continued)—Views on Spontaneous Generation | [153] |
| XXI.— | Variation Of Animals and Plants Under Domestication: Pangenesis (1868) | [161] |
| XXII.— | Pangenesis and Continuity of the Germ-Plasm: Darwin’s Confidence in Pangenesis | [178] |
| XXIII.— | Descent of Man—Expression of Emotions—Earth-Worms (1871–81) | [186] |
| XXIV.— | Botanical Works (1862–86) | [193] |
| XXV.— | Letters from Darwin to Professor Meldola (1871–82) | [199] |
| XXVI.— | His Last Illness (1882) | [219] |
| INDEX | [221] | |
Charles Darwin
AND THE
THEORY OF NATURAL SELECTION.
CHAPTER I.
THE SECRET OF DARWIN’S GREATNESS.
Charles Robert Darwin was born at Shrewsbury on February 12th, 1809, the year which witnessed the birth of Alfred Tennyson, W. E. Gladstone, and Abraham Lincoln.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, born in the same year, delighted to speak of the good company in which he came into the world. On January 27th, 1894, I had the great pleasure of sitting next to him at a dinner of the Saturday Club in Boston, and he then spoke of the subject with the same enthusiasm with which he deals with it in his writings; mentioning the four distinguished names, and giving a brief epigrammatic description of each with characteristic felicity. Dr. Holmes further said that he remembered with much satisfaction an occasion on which he was able to correct Darwin on a matter of scientific fact. He could not remember the details, but we may hope for their ultimate recovery, for he said that Darwin had written a courteous reply accepting the correction.
HIS FAMILY.
Charles Darwin’s grandfather, Erasmus Darwin (1731–1802), was a man of great genius. He speculated upon the origin of species, and arrived at views which were afterwards independently enunciated by Lamarck. He resembled this great zoologist in fertility of imagination, and also in the boldness with which he put forward suggestions, many of which were crude and entirely untested by an appeal to facts. The poetical form in which a part of his work was written was, doubtless, largely due to the traditions and customs of the age in which he lived.
Robert Waring (1766–1848), the father of Charles Darwin, was the second son of Erasmus. He married a daughter of the great Josiah Wedgwood. Although his mother died when he was only eight years old, and Darwin remembered very little of her, there is evidence that she directed his attention to Nature (“Autobiography,” p. 28, footnote). Dr. Darwin followed his father’s profession, commencing a very successful medical practice at Shrewsbury before he was twenty-one. He was a man of great penetration, especially in the discernment of character—a power which was of the utmost value to him in his profession. Dr. Darwin had two sons and four daughters: Charles was the younger son and fourth child, his brother Erasmus being the third.