and single man privileged to see "the first step by which conversion of a bear into a whale would be easy, would idan an offer no difficulty?" "In North America the black bear was seen by Hearne swimming for hours with widely open mouth, thus catching, almost like a whale, insects in the water!" (See Origin, p. 141; see also Darwin to Lyell on the case, ii. 234, 235, 336.) If one consults the Descent of Man, one will find in it three references to a Hearne, no doubt the same. "Hearne, an excellent observer"" that excellent observer Hearne," cries Mr. Darwin; and his authority in the footnote is, " A Journey from Prince of Wales Fort, 1796." That is almost a hundred years ago; surely by this time the bear will have got flippers, or at least the bulbs of them!

As we see, it was Mr. Darwin's habit to "collect facts on a wholesale scale," by "printed inquiries," by "conversation," and by "extensive reading;" and the result, "an immense number of facts collected from various sources," including this fact also, that "facts observed by others were (by him) very extensively used." Printed inquiries sent out to all and sundries, gardeners, breeders, dog-merchants, conversations as at the gin-palace in the Borough, an indiscriminate miscellaneous reading on the watch simply for any notice of a fact to wish,—surely such a method as this of compilation, if not loose, might be quite righteously termed "easy." So it is that, on the evidence of a single, we may almost say unknown man, Hearne, who wrote, may we not also almost say, an unknown book, nearly a hundred years ago, it is expected of us to believe the prodigious assertion, the actual miracle, that by swimming in water with an open mouth catching insects, "the conversion of a bear into a whale would be easy, would offer no difficulty!" There are readers, doubtless, who will say here, this is malicious—this is the making of a single extreme case

represent the matter of an entire and serious argument. But be it observed that at present we have not in view any illustration of the theory itself of Mr. Darwin. That will come later. What we have before us now is only the alleged looseness of Mr. Darwin in regard to the compilation of facts, as of his case in regard to the acceptance of them. Nor can it be said with any truth that we exaggerate Mr. Darwin's faith, as it were, in how "this old tale of Hearne the hunter goes." Consultation of our references will justify on our part every word we use. Mr. Darwin will, at the bidding of Lyell, "strike out" the whale; but "it goes to his heart," and it is only le premier pas qui coûte." The whale is struck out-of the second edition. But compunction follows, to lie at his heart still, for sacrifice of an illustration in which the salto mortale of the conversion of species into species "would be easy," "would offer no difficulty!!" And all that concerns "the whale and bear" is deliberately restored in the end, to be read now even in the sixth edition.

But if any one should still doubt of this ascription to Mr. Darwin of the usual pre-expectant, not unsolicitous compilation, let him turn up the Descent of Man simply at hazard, and the very first page at which he opens will at once convince him. The Rev. W. D. Fox informs me"—" Mr. Harrison Weir has inquired this same gentleman has bred "-"Mr. R. Elliot informs me""Mr. F. Buckland has bred "-" in regard to moles it is "Sir A. Smith remarks"-" Mr. Wright informs

said

me

Mr. Barr states "Prosper Lucas quotes "Hoffberg says ""A clergyman asserts "-"I am informed "-" from these facts there can be no doubt." Just let the reader follow example here and turn up such things, noting, too, how the whole flow of the proof

"Mr. Blenkison informs me" "Mr. H. Reeks assures me "

is literally nothing but a perpetual trickle of merely hypothetical and supposititious wills and woulds,—let him realise to himself what is absolutely the truth of this, -and I think he will be astounded that such a weight should be committed to so much that is at least reedy. “Man, made in the image of God, was also made in the image of the ape." It is curious how that single line -in which the ape clause is alone serious-absolutely reflects the entire spirit of the compilation in hand, and not less that of the shallow enlightenment of the day. It is to be admitted, at the same time, that what is immediately signalised is of a more glaring quality in the Descent than it is in the Origin.

The compilation that is the Origin, for all that, has still, in the main, been conducted on the same principles. What the Germans call Tendenz pervades it throughout. Tendenz that would annul slavery pointed to the common origin both of the white and the black in Eden; but Tendenz that would perpetuate slavery knew that the parentage of the negro was wholly different and brute! And it is Tendenz that is the soul of the Origin.

I do not suppose there is any quality for which Mr. Darwin has got more credit than what is called candour. Nor do I suppose that any one who has read what we have anywhere hitherto said of Mr. Darwin would reproach us with having made him other than the most upright, honest, veracious, and candid of mankind. Candour is not only the essential characteristic which is seen in Mr. Darwin by others, and we may even say all others, but it seems claimed as not much less by himself. What an illiberal sentence that is about my pretension to candour." These (ii. 313) are words of Mr. Darwin's own. He shows himself sensitive to that gird upon the part of the Edinburgh Reviewer to

his candour that, at all events, candour, he has not been in the habit of hearing sneered at, or denied to him. And it must be said that were not candour understood to be a chief and distinctive feature of Mr. Darwin's character, what portrait we have hitherto here seen of him would be without drawing: it would be irrecognisable. Nevertheless Tendenz is the soul of the Origin.

CHAPTER II.

WHAT LED TO THE WORK AND THE SUCCESS OF IT.

WE have begun on the Work. And so here a word is necessary, as well on what it was in Mr. Darwin that led to the peculiarity of that work, as on what it was in others that at least contributed to the success of it. We shall take the latter clause, as simpler, first.

Mr. Darwin tells us-In regard to what "is no doubt the chief work of my life" (i. 86), "my first note-book was opened in July 1837" (i. 83). That work was, of course, The Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection. Now, almost from that time onwards to a very late period, there commenced and proceeded a very intimate correspondence on the part of Mr. Darwin with all that then was closest to him in the point of view of friendship and esteem. This correspondence may be divided on the whole into two periods, according as it covers dates that precede, or dates that succeed, the publication of the Origin. In a broad way we may say that all this that is here indicated is contained in the second volume of the Life and Letters, at the same time that not a little of it obtains as well throughout the whole of the third volume. There are only three or four correspondents to whom Mr. Darwin is critically confidential before publication of the Origin; and they are Lyell, Hooker, Asa Gray, and Wallace. There are many, so to speak, scattered corre