PDF - Wallace Online
PDF - Wallace Online PDF - Wallace Online
458 TROPICAL NATUREHe also saw, at this early period, the important fact thatthere is some great and constant check to the increase of wildanimals, though most of them breed very rapidly, and, ofcourse, would increase in a geometrical ratio were some suchcheck not in constant action. He traces the comparativerarity of a species to less favourable conditions of existence,and extinction to the normal action of still more unfavourableconditions, and compares the destruction of a species by manand its extinction by its natural enemies as being phenomenaof the same essential nature. The various classes of factshere referred to seemed to him " to throw some light on theorigin of species that mystery of mysteries, as it has beencalled by one of our greatest philosophers " and he tells us;that, soon after his return home in 1837, it occurred to him" that something might perhaps be made out on this questionby patiently accumulating and reflecting on all sorts of factswhich could possibly have any bearing uponit." We knowfrom his own statement that he had already perceived that noexplanation but some form of the derivation or developmenthypothesis, as it was then termed, would adequately explainthe remarkable facts of distribution and geological successionwhich he had observed during his voyage ; yet he tells usthat he worked on for five years before he allowed himself tospeculate on the subject; and then, having formulated hisprovisional hypothesis in a definite shape during the nexttwo years, he devoted another fifteen years to continuousobservation, experiment, and literary research, before he gaveto the astounded scientific world an abstract of his theory inall its wide-embracing scope and vast array of evidence, in hisepoch-making volume, The Origin of Species.If we add to the periods enumerated above the five years'observation and study during the voyage, we find that thiswork was the outcome of twenty -seven years of continuousthought and labour, by one of the most patient, most truthloving,and most acute intellects of our age. Duringall thislong period only a very few of his most intimate friends wereaware that he had departed from the then beaten track ofbiological study, while the great body of naturalists onlyknew him as a good geologist, as the writer of an interestingbook of travels, and the author of an admirable monograph of
ix THE DEBT OF SCIENCE TO DARWIN 459the cirripedia or barnacles, as well as of a most ingeniousexplanation of the origin and structure of coral-reefs aseries of volumes which were the direct outcome of hisvoyage, and which gave him an established reputation. Evenwhen the great work at last appeared, few could appreciatethe enormous basis of fact and experiment on which it rested,until, during the succeeding twenty years, there appearedthat remarkable succession of works which exhibited a sample(and only a sample) of the exhaustless store of materials andthe profound maturity of thought on which his early volumewas founded. From these various works, aided by some personalintercourse and a correspondence extending over twentyyears, the present writer will endeavour to indicate thenature and extent of Darwin's researches.Studies of Domestic AnimalsAlthough, as we have said, Darwin had early arrived atthe conclusion that allied species had descended from commonancestors by gradual modification, it long remained to him aninexplicable problem how the necessary degree of modificationcould have been effected, and he adds : "It would thushave remained for ever, had I not studied domestic productions,and thus acquired a just idea of the power of selection."These researches, very briefly sketched in the first and partsof the fifth and ninth chapters of the Origin of Species, werepublished at length (after a delay of nine years, owing to illhealth) in two large volumes, with the title Animals and PlantsUnder Domestication; and no one who has not read thesecan form an adequate idea of the wide range and thoroughcharacter of the investigation on which every statement orsuggestion in the former work was founded.The copious references to authorities show us that hemust have searched through almost the entire literature ofagriculture and horticulture, of horse and cattle breeding, ofsporting, of dog, cat, pigeon, and fowl fancying, includingendless series of reviews, magazines, journals of societies, andnewspapers, besides every scientific treatise bearing in anyway on the subject, whether published in this country, on theContinent, or in America. The facts thus laboriously gatheredwere supplemented by personal inquiries among zoologists and
- Page 424 and 425: TROPICAL NATUREpurple or blue, thre
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- Page 436 and 437: 420 TROPICAL NATUREprotoplasm up to
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- Page 466 and 467: IXTHE DEBT OF SCIENCE TO DARWIN 1Th
- Page 468 and 469: 452 TROPICAL NATUREanatomy could be
- Page 470 and 471: 454 TROPICAL NATUREthat each specie
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- Page 476 and 477: 460 TROPICAL NATUREbotanists, farme
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- Page 488 and 489: 472 TROPICAL NATUREDarwin had colle
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- Page 492 and 493: INDEXABBOTT, C. C., on American pal
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458 TROPICAL NATUREHe also saw, at this early period, the important fact thatthere is some great and constant check to the increase of wildanimals, though most of them breed very rapidly, and, ofcourse, would increase in a geometrical ratio were some suchcheck not in constant action. He traces the comparativerarity of a species to less favourable conditions of existence,and extinction to the normal action of still more unfavourableconditions, and compares the destruction of a species by manand its extinction by its natural enemies as being phenomenaof the same essential nature. The various classes of factshere referred to seemed to him " to throw some light on theorigin of species that mystery of mysteries, as it has beencalled by one of our greatest philosophers " and he tells us;that, soon after his return home in 1837, it occurred to him" that something might perhaps be made out on this questionby patiently accumulating and reflecting on all sorts of factswhich could possibly have any bearing uponit." We knowfrom his own statement that he had already perceived that noexplanation but some form of the derivation or developmenthypothesis, as it was then termed, would adequately explainthe remarkable facts of distribution and geological successionwhich he had observed during his voyage ; yet he tells usthat he worked on for five years before he allowed himself tospeculate on the subject; and then, having formulated hisprovisional hypothesis in a definite shape during the nexttwo years, he devoted another fifteen years to continuousobservation, experiment, and literary research, before he gaveto the astounded scientific world an abstract of his theory inall its wide-embracing scope and vast array of evidence, in hisepoch-making volume, The Origin of Species.If we add to the periods enumerated above the five years'observation and study during the voyage, we find that thiswork was the outcome of twenty -seven years of continuousthought and labour, by one of the most patient, most truthloving,and most acute intellects of our age. Duringall thislong period only a very few of his most intimate friends wereaware that he had departed from the then beaten track ofbiological study, while the great body of naturalists onlyknew him as a good geologist, as the writer of an interestingbook of travels, and the author of an admirable monograph of
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