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The Life of Charles Darwin, with British Opinion on Evolution. Compiled by G. W. BACON, F.R.G.S. London: G. W. Bacon and Co.

IN analysing this biography of our great naturalist we cannot help noticing that the hostility against him and his teachings, which had of late years greatly subsided, has to some extent been rekindled. M. Moigno has characterised the faint praise of M. de Quatrefages as savouring too much of academical courtesy. Nearer home a writer has sprung up, who, though palpably new to the study of biological science, boldly ventures to lay down the law on this its most complicated and difficult question. It is too much to hope that the case should be otherwise. In England the public is apt to listen with respect to opinions confidently expressed, to arguments and objections

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difficult to meet because totally beside the question, without insisting that the author should have given the subject any prolonged and careful attention.

The little work before us gives a fair, though brief, biography of Darwin, in as far as it can be furnished from sources generally open to the public. Of his descent from Erasmus Darwin, and of the generally intellectual character of the family, the public is already well aware. But it is interesting to learn that Robert, the father of Erasmus, had some scientific and poetical tastes, and that his wife was a very learned lady. Her husband does not seem to have admired her classical attainments, for he composed a kind of Litany, one verse of which runs—

"From a morning that doth shine,
From a boy that drinketh wine,
From a wife that talketh Latine,
Good Lord deliver me."

The Darwin race seems to be an admirable instance of heredity. They have almost invariably lived to a good age. For at least four generations the family has been far above the average run of civilised mankind in intellect, and in two instances it has reached the height of that rare attribute, genius. They have repeatedly intermarried with other families of an unusual mental calibre, "a fact which will be at once recognised on noting that both the mother and the wife of the illustrious Evolutionist were descendants of Josiah Wedgwood. Another point to be noticed is their persistence in selecting professional careers. For 260 years, when not country gentlemen, they have been physicians, less generally lawyers, or soldiers. We do not learn that any member of the family has been engaged in trade, nor have they aimed at a parliamentary career or at official position of any kind. They have been men of thought rather than of action, in the ordinary sense of the word.

The life of him whom we call the great Darwin was singularly quiet, and characterised by a philosophic simplicity rare in this age of turmoil, bustle, and ostentation. After his memorable voyage he rarely left his home, and lived mainly in his works. Though a member of several of the principal scientific societies of London, and warmly interested in their welfare, he rarely attended their meetings, save to communicate some of his results, and here, as in all his doings, he showed a most remarkable modesty and an "evident unconsciousness of his own greatness. "Self, indeed, with him, was completely merged in his devotion to his subject. He never delivered a public lecture, never filled the presidential chair of the British Association, or of any of its sections. Most singular, he took no part in the great Darwinian controversy, which began in 1859 with the appearance of his great work the "Origin of Species." To all reasonable, candid doubters and dissidents he was ready to reply in an exemplary

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spirit of patience. Those who assailed him with abuse he left to be dealt with by the numerous and able disciples who—alike in this country, in Germany, and in America—were gathering round him.

The second portion of the little work before us, "British Opinion on Evolution," consists of tributes to the greatness of Darwin paid by men and by journals of the most varied parties and sects, yet all uniting in their appreciation of his genius and of his work. Whether the writers of these official eulogiums worshipped the Darwin of reality, or some picture of him limned more or less according to their own notions of what he should have been, the future must show. The time has not yet come for us to understand all his greatness.

Mr. Bacon's "Life of Darwin" ought to be found in every school-library, and in the home of every thoughtful working man.