generation; so that, at this eleventh hour, and even failing anything new,
it may be useful to state afresh that which is true, and to put the
fundamental positions advocated by Mr. Darwin in such a form that they may
be grasped by those whose special studies lie in other directions. And the
adoption of this course may be the more advisable, because, notwithstanding
its great deserts, and indeed partly on account of them, the "Origin of
Species" is by no means an easy book to read--if by reading is implied the
full comprehension of an author's meaning.

We do not speak jestingly in saying that it is Mr. Darwin's misfortune to
know more about the question he has taken up than any man living.
Personally and practically exercised in zoology, in minute anatomy, in
geology; a student of geographical distribution, not on maps and in museums
only, but by long voyages and laborious collection; having largely advanced
each of these branches of science, and having spent many years in gathering
and sifting materials for his present work, the store of accurately
registered facts upon which the author of the "Origin of Species" is able
to draw at will is prodigious.

But this very superabundance of matter must have been embarrassing to a
writer who, for the present, can only put forward an abstract of his views;
and thence it arises, perhaps, that notwithstanding the clearness of the
style, those who attempt fairly to digest the book find much of it a sort
of intellectual pemmican--a mass of facts crushed and pounded into shape,
rather than held together by the ordinary medium of an obvious logical
bond; due attention will, without doubt, discover this bond, but it is
often hard to find.

Again, from sheer want of room, much has to be taken for granted which
might readily enough be proved; and hence, while the adept, who can supply