to send to Pictet, as I told A. Gray I
would, thinking from what he said he would like this to be done. I doubt
whether it would be possible to get the October number reprinted in this
country; so that I am in no hurry at all for this.

I had a letter a few weeks ago from Symonds on the imperfection of the
Geological Record, less clear and forcible than I expected. I answered
him at length and very civilly, though I could hardly make out what
he was driving at. He spoke about you in a way which it did me good to
read.

I am extremely glad that you like A. Gray's reviews. How generous and
unselfish he has been in all his labour! Are you not struck by his
metaphors and similes? I have told him he is a poet and not a lawyer.

I should altogether doubt on turtles being converted into land tortoises
on any one island. Remember how closely similar tortoises are on all
continents, as well as islands; they must have all descended from one
ancient progenitor, including the gigantic tortoise of the Himalaya.

I think you must be cautious in not running the convenient doctrine that
only one species out of very many ever varies. Reflect on such cases as
the fauna and flora of Europe, North America, and Japan, which are so
similar, and yet which have a great majority of their species either
specifically distinct, or forming well-marked races. We must in such
cases incline to the belief that a multitude of species were once
identically the same in all the three countries when under a warmer
climate and more in connection; and have varied in all the three
countries. I am inclined to believe that almost every species (as we
see with nearly all our domestic productions) varies sufficiently for
Natural Selection to pick out and accumulate new specific differences,
under new organic and inorganic conditions of life, whenever a place is
open in the polity of nature. But looking to a long lapse of time and to
the whole world, or to large parts of the world, I believe only one or
a few species of each large genus ultimately becomes victorious, and
leaves modified descendants. To give an imaginary instance: the jay has
become modified in the three countries into (I believe) three or four
species; but the jay genus is not, apparently, so dominant a group
as the crows; and in the long run probably all the jays will be
exterminated and be replaced perhaps by some modified crows.

I merely give this illustration to show what seems to me prob