You will have seen the eclaircissement about the Eocene monkeys
of England. By a touch of the conjuring wand they have been
metamorphosed--a la Darwin--into Hyracotherian pigs. (142/2. "On the
Hyracotherian Character of the Lower Molars of the supposed Macacus from
the Eocene Sand of Kyson, Suffolk." "Ann. Mag. Nat. Hist." Volume X.,
1862, page 240. In this note Owen stated that the teeth which he had
named Macacus ("Ann. Mag." 1840, page 191) most probably belonged to
Hyracotherium cuniculus. See "A Catalogue of British Fossil Vertebrata,"
A.S. Woodward and C.D. Sherborn, 1890, under Hyracotherium, page 356;
also Zittel's "Handbuch der Palaeontologie" Abth. I., Bd. IV., Leipzig,
1891-93, page 703.) Would you believe it? This even is a gross blunder.
They are not pigs.

LETTER 143. TO HUGH FALCONER. Down, October 1st [1862].

On my return home yesterday I found your letter and MS., which I have
read with extreme interest. Your note and every word in your paper are
expressed with the same kind feeling which I have experienced from you
ever since I have had the happiness of knowing you. I value scientific
praise, but I value incomparably higher such kind feeling as yours.
There is not a single word in your paper to which I could possibly
object: I should be mad to do so; its only fault is perhaps its too
great kindness. Your case seems the most striking one which I have met
with of the persistence of specific characters. It is very much the more
striking as it relates to the molar teeth, which differ so much in the
species of the genus, and in which consequently I should have expected
variation. As I read on I felt not a little dumbfounded, and thought to
myself that whenever I came to this subject I should have to be savage
against myself; and I wondered how savage you would be. I trembled a
little. My only hope was that something could be made out of the bog
N. American forms, which you rank as a geographical race; and possibly
hereafter out of the Sicilian species. Guess, then, my satisfaction when
I found that you yourself made a loophole (143/1. This perhaps refers
to a passage ("N.H. Review," 1863, page 79) in which Falconer allows the
existence of intermediate forms along certain possible lines of descent.
Falconer's reference to the Sicilian elephants is in a note on page 78;
the bog-elephant is mentioned on page 79.), which I never, of course,
could have guessed at; and imagine my still greater satisfaction at