[page] iv

Prof. Owen, in assuming the chair of the section on Zoölogy, etc., noticed the progress of Natural Science in Australia and the United States as follows: […]

[page] v

[…]

"There is another work, upon a similar subject advertised, from which we may expect some curious reasonings, 'On the origin of species and varieties,' by Charles Darwin."

[page] viii

[…]

"On this difficult and mysterious subject a work will very shortly appear, by Mr. Charles Darwin, the result of twenty years of observation and experiments in Zöology, Botany, and Geology, by which he been led to the conclusion , that those powers of nature which give rise to races and permanent varieties in animals and plants, are the same as those which, in much longer periods, produce species, and, in a still longer series of ages, give rise to differences of generic rank. He appears to me to have succeeded, by his investigations and reasonings, to have thrown a flood of light on many classes of phenomena connected with the affinities, geographical distribution, and geological succession of organic beings, for which no other hypothesis has been able, or has even attempted, to account.