Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 357 pages of information about Alfred Russel Wallace.

Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 357 pages of information about Alfred Russel Wallace.

[107] The pages refer to Vol.  II. of Wallace’s “Geographical Distribution.”

[108] The number (4) was erroneously omitted.—­A.R.W.

[109] An error:  should have been the Australian.—­A.R.W.

[110] Axel Blytt, “Essay on the Immigration of the Norwegian Flora.”  Christiania, 1876.

[111] June 22, 1876, p. 165 et seq.

[112] “The Origin of Species and Genera.”

[113] “Island Life.”

[114] In “My Life” (ii. 12-13) Wallace writes; “With this came seven foolscap pages of notes, many giving facts from his extensive reading which I had not seen.  There were also a good many doubts and suggestions on the very difficult questions in the discussion of the causes of the glacial epochs.  Chapter XXIII., discussing the Arctic element in South Temperate floras, was the part he most objected to, saying, ’This is rather too speculative for my old noddle.  I must think that you overrate the importance of new surfaces on mountains and dispersal from mountain to mountain.  I still believe in alpine plants having lived on the lowlands and in the southern tropical regions having been cooled during glacial periods, and thus only can I understand character of floras on the isolated African mountains.  It appears to me that you are not justified in arguing from dispersal to oceanic islands to mountains.  Not only in latter cases currents of sea are absent, but what is there to make birds fly direct from one alpine summit to another?  There is left only storms of wind, and if it is probable or possible that seeds may thus be carried for great distances, I do not believe that there is at present any evidence of their being thus carried more than a few miles.’  This is the most connected piece of criticism in the notes, and I therefore give it verbatim.”

[115] “Nature, December 9, 1880.  The substance of this article by Mr. Baker, of Kew, is given in ‘More Letters,’ vol. iii. 25, in a footnote.”—­“My Life,” ii. 13.

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Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.