I thought, given the interest in Charles Darwin spurred by his 198th birthday, I would give Daily Kos readers the chance to read a little excerpt from my adult developmental biography of Darwin. The latter was researched from original correspondence, diaries, and secondary sources for my dissertation some years ago.
What I offer below is a slightly edited section concerning a very famous episode: the delivery of Alfred Russel Wallace's letter to Darwin announcing the former's discovery of the theory of natural selection -- the very same theory Darwin had been working on in secret for almost 20 years!
As Darwin's mentor, Charles Lyell, had warned the diffident Darwin, his procrastination in publishing would lose him the priority of his scientific discovery. Meanwhile, there was a diptheria epidemic sweeping the countryside, and Darwin's young son had taken ill...
Smashed
In early June, 1858, Charles was spending his days lying on a sofa, confined there with a boil, and awaiting Hooker's response to his manuscript. It arrived by the 8th. Charles wrote back to Hooker right away. [John Hooker was Darwin's friend and curator at Kew Gardens. He was only one of a handful of men to whom Darwin had told his secret: that he was a "transmutationist". Hooker was eight years younger than Darwin.]
You would laugh, if you could know how much your note pleased me. I had firmest conviction that you would say all my M.S was bosh, & thank God you are one of the few men who dare speak truth. Though I shd. not have cared much about throwing away what you have seen, yet I have been forced to confess to myself that all was much alike, & if you condemned that you wd. condemn all -- my life's work -- & that I confess made me a little low -- but I cd. have borne it, for I have the conviction that I have honestly done my best. (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 102)
Buoyed by Hooker's positive first impressions, Darwin turned to write up the bee cell results. He felt some of the specimens were so interesting, he sent a queen larva and pupa on to [John] Lubbock [a young neighbor] for his collection. On June 11 he received a letter from [his cousin, William] Fox remonstrating him for his perpetual overwork. "I think you are a very bad Husband & Father," Fox nagged, "to let yourself get into such a state" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 106). On June 18, Darwin received a large package from [Alfred] Wallace in the mail. [Darwin had exchanged a few letters with the young collector over the years.] What he saw there shocked him.
Wallace had sent a manuscript entitled "On the tendency of varieties to depart indefinitely from the original type". He asked Darwin to peruse it, and if he thought it worthy, to send it to Lyell. Darwin read the manuscript and then wrote Lyell.
Some year or so ago, you recommended me to read a paper by Wallace in the Annals, which had interested you.... He has to day sent me the enclosed & asked me to forward it to you. It seems to me well worth reading. Your words have come true with a vengeance that I shd. be forestalled.... if Wallace had my M.S. sketch written out in 1842 he could not have made a better short abstract! Even his terms now stand as Heads of my Chapters....
I shall of course at once write [Wallace] & offer to send to any Journal. So all my originality, whatever it may amount to, will be smashed. Though my Book, if it will ever have any value, will not be deteriorated; as all the labour consists in the application of the theory. (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 107)
In one of the great coincidences in the history of science, Wallace had discovered the concept of natural selection in the jungles of the Malay Archipelago just as Darwin was preparing his long book on the subject. Darwin seemed stunned. Yet the letters of the next few days do not mention Wallace. Two days later, Charles wrote to his son to remind him to watch his money while he travelled, and complained about the large number of relatives then visiting the house. In addition, Etty had become sick. But, Darwin told his son, the bee-cell work was going so well, he was sure his theory of the evolution of bee instinct, as an exemplar of natural selection, "will hold good" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 113). On June 23, Darwin wrote Hooker. He did not mention being upset by the Wallace affair, but was dreadfully worried because Etty's sore throat had turned out to be diphtheria, then epidemic in England. "We are both rather knocked up," Darwin told his friend, "& I have not spirits to see anyone, even you, at present" (p. 115).
On June 24, six days after receiving Wallace's letter, Charles wrote his cousin Fox, but the subject was neither Wallace nor the species work. Darwin was incensed at a scandal involving his current doctor. Edward Lane had been accused by the husband of one of his former patients of having an affair with his wife some 13 years earlier, and was named in divorce proceedings the husband had brought against his wife, Mrs. Henry Robinson. The evidence rested upon a diary purportedly kept by Mrs. Robinson. The scandal had even made the pages of The Times. Darwin thought Lane was innocent, the victim of "a story prompted by extreme sensuality or hallucination" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 116). He thought the case would ruin Lane. In passing, Charles mentioned that, while Etty seemed to have struggled through the worst of her illness, 18 month old Charles Waring had developed a fever.
Despite the illness and the scandal, the Wallace affair was not far from Darwin's mind. He had decided to write a letter to Wallace, informing him that he would not publish until Wallace did. The letter was half written when a message from Lyell arrived in the mail. Hooker and Lyell had been discussing the situation of their friend, and felt a great wrong would be perpetrated if Darwin were to lose all priority for what they knew was his discovery. Yet they were aware that Wallace's claim had priority status as well. Lyell seems to have asked Darwin whether some sketch might not still be published. This letter has also not been found. Darwin replied to Lyell on June 25. He was torn over the correct course to take and asked for Lyell's advice.
.... if you will give me your deliberate opinion, you will do me as great a service, as ever man did, for I have entire confidence in your judgment & honour....
There is nothing in Wallace's sketch which is not written out much fuller in my sketch copied in 1844, & read by Hooker some dozen years ago. About a year ago I sent a short sketch of which I have copy of my views... to Asa Gray, so that I could most truly say & prove that I take nothing from Wallace. I shd. be extremely glad now to publish a sketch of my general views in about a dozen pages or so. But I cannot persuade myself that I can do so honourably.... I would far rather burn my whole book than that he or any man shd. think that I had behaved in a paltry spirit. Do you not think his having sent me this sketch ties my hands? (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, pp. 117-118)
Lyell did not take such a pessimistic view as Darwin. But by then, Darwin was racked by conscience. He wrote to Lyell again to make the case even stronger against himself. "The advantage which I should take," he told him, "being that I am induced to publish from privately knowing that Wallace is in the field.... it wd. be dishonourable in me now to publish" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 119). Meanwhile, there was much worry in the house. The baby's fever was getting worse. "What has frightened us so," Charles told Lyell in the same letter quoted immediately above, "is, that 3 children have died in village from Scarlet Fever, and others have been at death's door, with terrible suffering" (p. 119).
The next day, June 27, Charles told his cousin Fox the diagnosis was sure. His youngest son had scarlet fever. Two days later, Darwin wrote Hooker:
You will, & so will Mrs Hooker, be most sorry for us when you hear that poor Baby died yesterday evening. I hope to God he did not suffer so much as he appeared.... Thank God he will never suffer more in this world.
I have received your letters. I cannot think now on subject, but soon will. But I can see that you have acted with more kindness & so has Lyell even than I could have expected from you both most kind as you are. (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 121)
As arrangements were made for the funeral, Charles was rushing to gather papers to send to Hooker. Lyell and Hooker had devised a scheme whereby Wallace's paper would be read to the next meeting of the Linnean Society, along with Darwin's abstract to Gray and selections from Darwin's 1844 sketch. Charles gathered the papers, though he was practically at wits' end. Sending the materials to Hooker on the 29th, with the Linnean meeting, as well as his son's funeral, only two days away, Darwin was spent.
I am quite prostrated & can do nothing but I send Wallace & my abstract of abstract of letter to Gray.... I daresay all is too late. I hardly care about it....
I really cannot bear to look at it [i.e., the 1844 sketch]. -- Do not waste much time. It is miserable in me to care at all about priority.
.... I would make a similar, but shorter & more accurate sketch for Linnean Journal. -- I will do anything" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 121)
On July 1, 1858, the joint papers of Wallace and Darwin were read at the Linnean Society. Lyell and Hooker were present, while Darwin was ill and mourning at home, while Wallace was thousands of miles away, unaware of any of these events. After 21 years, as he neared 50 years old, Darwin's theory was now officially out. But hardly anyone noticed. In his autobiography, Charles could remember only one published notice, a review by a Professor Haughton of Dublin, who was less than impressed (Barlow, 1958).
Darwin did not really have much time to consider the consequences of the Linnean meeting. On his cousin Fox's advice, he was gathering his family to temporarily flee fever-plagued Down. One of the family's nurses had caught the fever, and by July 21, five children were dead in Down. The children were sent immediately to Emma's sister's house in Sussex, while Charles and Emma stayed on until Henrietta was well enough to move. Darwin told Fox, "I of course stay till nurse is out of all danger whatever" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 124).
Hooker wrote to tell Darwin how well everything went at the Linnean Society meeting. "You must let me once again tell you," Charles told his friend, "how deeply I feel your generous kindness & Lyell's on this occasion. But in truth it shames me that you should have lost time on a mere point of priority" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 127). Nevertheless, Darwin now was willing to consider drawing up some kind of abstract of his theory. He asked Hooker how many pages might be spared him for such an essay in the journal of the Linnean Society. Writing Hooker on July 5, he explained:
Directly after my return home, I would begin & cut my cloth to my measure. -- If the Referees were to reject it as not strictly scientific I could, perhaps publish it as pamphlet....
Lastly you said you would write to Wallace; I certainly shd. much like this, as it would quite exonerate me....
.... You know that I look at it, as very important, for the reception of the view of species not being immutable, the fact of the greatest geologist & Botanist in England, taking any sort of interest in subject: I am sure it will do much to break down prejudices. (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, pp. 127-128)
By the middle of July, Darwin and his family had taken up residence on the Isle of Wight. After ten days at Sandown, the family moved to a much newer resort community at Shanklin. Despite the medical necessity, Darwin grumbled over the move. He told Hooker, "We are too old & feeble a party for anywhere but home" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 137). Resting at the Isle of Wight, Darwin began to consider all that had just happened. The first convert from the Linnean papers was Hooker himself, whose previous doubts were melting away. "You cannot imagine," Darwin wrote his friend, "how pleased I am that the notion of Natural Selection has acted as a purgative on your bowels of immutability" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 130).
Charles wrote to thank Lyell for all his assistance. He was actually glad that Wallace's paper had pushed the matter forward, though he was "certainly a little annoyed to lose all priority" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 137). He told Lyell that he was going to prepare a longer abstract, "but it really is impossible to do justice to the subject" (p. 137). By the end of July, Darwin's stomach was still agitated over past troubles, and Etty and Lenny weren't getting any better, despite the seaside environment. Meanwhile, Darwin had already started working a couple of hours each day on the new abstract. "I find it amusing & improving work," Charles told Hooker, "it will be longer than I expected" (p. 140).
Meanwhile, Darwin had gotten word of Henslow's disapproval of his theory. Henslow had helped, along with Hooker, George Busk , and Thomas Huxley, prepare Darwin's manuscripts read at the Linnean for publication in that society's journal. Charles wrote Henslow that the stay at the Isle of Wight meant he would miss seeing his former teacher at Down that summer. He added that he hoped to see Henslow soon, "as I shd. be extremely glad (& grateful) to hear your objections to my species speculations. The difficulties I can see are many & grave" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 146).
The days at Shanklin grew pleasant. Etty was feeling better, and the work on the abstract proceeded apace. On August 12, Darwin returned to Down, and immediately resumed work on the pigeons, writing up his results between sessions on the abstract. Towards the end of the month, Hooker dropped by Down, bringing with him a fellow botanist from Dublin. At the beginning of September, Charles received an invitation to preside over the Zoological Section of the British Association meeting scheduled for Leeds later in the month. But he declined, citing the poor state of his health.
But poor health did not keep him from work at home. By September 8, the pigeon examinations were done. Darwin killed off many of the experimental cross-bred birds, and offered Tegetmeier first choice of the rest. "If you are inclined to come," Darwin told him, "I shall much enjoy seeing you, but my health has lately been bad that I am physically incapable of talking for long" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 154). Besides the scientific work, Charles had to arrange for William's first semester at Cambridge. Darwin asked Henslow for advice on an appropriate allowance for his son. There were linen and dinnerware to buy and ship, and trips to London to set up accounts at the bank. And there were also requests, for even when abroad, his children were still agents of Darwin's giant research project. Writing to [his oldest son] William on September 22, Charles asked:
If you go out shooting look at Birds' feet & see if any dirt sticks to them: I want to collect such dirt, & see if by any splendid chance a plant would come up, for then could I not carry seed across the sea! (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 158)
By early October, William was beginning the Michaelmas term at Cambridge. The third oldest son, Francis, began seeing George's old tutor, the Reverend George Reed. There were other distractions from work as well. Charles had taken up the cause of a former attendant at the British Museum, Stephen Parrell, who he remembered had been so obliging in finding materials and books for him. Darwin was trying to procure him a better position, but the conservative aristocrats running the British Museum had already decided against Parrell, and dismissed him for being financially insolvent. Charles complained to Hooker, Parrell "says that if no penitence for extravagance can ever redeem the fault there is no hope for a man, who has thus ever erred ever to rise again; & this seems true" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 164).
Darwin's younger children continued to suffer ill health. "What a strange form of inherited constitution this is," Charles told Hooker (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 165). Meanwhile, the abstract kept growing. Darwin thought in early October the work would take him another three or four months. Still, he was grateful for the task. "It has clarified my brains much, by making me weigh relative importance of the several elements" (p. 165). By the middle of the month, Charles was sure that the abstract would turn out a small volume, too large for publication in a journal. He was also sure that his health required another trip to the water cure. But first, he needed to run to London to see Falconer. Charles was unaware of many of the names of the bones among his pigeon skeletons. He had to show them to Falconer "to get a little rudimentary knowledge" (p. 161).
Darwin's nerves were getting frayed. On October 12, he wrote Hooker, begging him not to judge too harshly his theory of natural selection. A week later he had to write back and apologize.
I wrote the sentence without reflection. But the truth is that I have so accustomed myself, partly from being quizzed by my non-naturalist relations, to expect opposition & even contempt, that I forgot for the moment that you are the one living soul from whom I have constantly received sympathy....
It is an accursed evil to a man to become so absorbed in any subject as I am in mine.
I was in London yesterday for a few hours with Falconer, & he gave me a magnificent lecture on age of man. We are not upstarts; we can boast of a pedigree going far back in time coeval with extinct species. (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 174)
Darwin arrived at Moor Park on October 25. After only four or five days, he was feeling rested and well. He had spent time talking with "some pleasant & clever men" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 178). Returning home at the beginning of November, Emma noted that Charles seemed "very brisk" (p. 179). On November 5, he wrote William, "We are all rather extra well & jolly here, & the Boys are going to have 5s worth of fireworks & a bon-fire" (p. 184). A few days later, Darwin heard that the Royal Society had recommended Lyell for its prestigious Copley Medal. Hooker was supposed to deliver a speech for the occasion, and he and Darwin batted about suggestions for it during the next few weeks.
The work on the abstract continued. The chapter on Instinct was finished on November 13, the chapter on Hybridism at the end of the month. Against his better judgment, Darwin had become embroiled in a controversy over moving the natural history collection of the British Museum from its Bloomsbury home to a new facility in Kensington. The chronic symptoms of overwork and fatigue set in once again. Charles told Hooker towards the end of the month, "Daily after my work is done at 12 oclock my head swims so that I can hardly walk" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 206). Meanwhile, he was pleased to see his third oldest son taking an interest in collecting beetles. It reminded him of the old days, he told Fox.
[John] Henslow [Darwin's old teacher and mentor from Cambridge] visited Down at the end of November. He "has left me in a fit of enthusiastic admiration of his character," Darwin wrote Hooker. "He is a really noble & good man" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 212). Charles had skipped a meeting of the Philosophical Club in order to see Henslow. By early December, he was again thinking of missing a Club meeting. But this time he was complaining of his health. "My head feels so queer," Charles told Hooker on the 3rd, "that I am going to consult a Doctor" (p. 214).
Meanwhile, William had found his rooms at Christ's too noisy, and with his father's approval, he moved into Charles's old quarters at the college.
Darwin wrote to his son:
I do hope that you will keep to your already acquired energetic & industrious habits: your success in life will mainly depend on this. So much for preachment, but it is a good & old established custom that he who pays may preach; & as I shall have to pay if you move, (as I rather advise) so I have had my preach.
Mamma is gone to London about her false teeth & returns tomorrow probably with Aunt Susan. At Christmas we shall have all Hensleigh, Uncle Eras. I hope, & all the Leith Hillites, & we shall in that case be 21 (!) gentleman-souls in the House & 31 souls of all kind! (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 215)
On December 11, Darwin finished abstracting his chapter on geological succession, and on the 14th felt well enough to go to London for the Club meeting. On Christmas Eve, Charles reported his progress on the book to Hooker. He had written 330 folio pages, and thought he had another 150 to 200 pages to go. "The subject really seems to me too large for discussion at any Society, & I believe Religion would be brought in by men, whom I know" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 221). Also on Christmas Eve, another shipment of fowls arrived from Tegetmeier. Darwin had decided to conduct some follow-up experiments to the pigeon work.
Back and forth continued the scientific exchange between Darwin and Hooker. Buoyed by a government salary raise, Hooker was writing a book about the flora of Australia, with an introduction describing Tasmania, and he was writing it as a converted transmutationist. How could Darwin call Eurasian plants "higher" than Australian, Hooker wanted to know. Darwin agreed. The term was to be avoided, "for I do not think any one has a definite idea what is meant by higher, except in classes which can loosely be compared with man.... When we are dead & gone what a noble subject will be Geographical Distribution!" (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, pp. 230-231).
The new year, 1859, brought the same old complaints. Darwin's children continued in delicate health. Darwin wrote his former servant, Syms Covington, in Australia, who was by now practically deaf.
My own health keeps very poor & I never know 24 hours comfort. I force myself to try & bear this as inscrutable misfortune. We all have our unhappiness, only some are worse than others. And you have a heavy one in your deafness. (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 235)
In the middle of January, Darwin was thrilled to receive the Geological Society's Wollaston Medal. He was surprised, because he had long since done little geology due to his health. But he would not be present for the medal's presentation, and Lyell accepted it by proxy. Darwin's condition had deteriorated to such a degree that he had decided to go to Moor Park once again. Before he left, Charles wrote Hooker, who was experiencing some writing difficulties of his own:
I have often experienced what you call the humiliating feeling of getting more & more involved in doubt.... But I always comfort myself with thinking of the future & in the full belief that the problems, which we are just entering on, will some day be solved; & if we just break the ground, we shall have done some service, even if we reap no harvest. (Burkhardt & Smith, 1991, v. 7, p. 236)
Author's note
The references to Burkhardt & Smith are to the magesterial Complete Correspondence of Charles Darwin, still being published by Cambridge University Press. All Dawrin scholars, or any Darwin enthusiast or student of science should shell out the approx. $100 per volume. Imagine, getting to spend hours in intimate contact with Darwin, his family, his co-thinkers, even some of his enemies. -- Wonderful.
Hope you liked this chapter.