Today | News | Books | Recipes Adventure | Science Fiction | Ghost stories | Poetry | Children | History Bookatel, 1840.); as for his inferences and reasoning on
the valley of the Amazon that is quite another question, nor can he have
seen all the regions to which Mrs. A. alludes. (363/2. A letter from
Mrs. Agassiz to Lady Lyell, which had been forwarded to Mr. Darwin. The
same letter was sent also to Sir Charles Bunbury, who, in writing to
Lyell on February 3rd, 1866, criticises some of the statements. He
speaks of Agassiz's observations on glacial phenomena in Brazil as "very
astonishing indeed; so astonishing that I have very great difficulty in
believing them. They shake my faith in the glacial system altogether; or
perhaps they ought rather to shake the faith in Agassiz...If Brazil
was ever covered with glaciers, I can see no reason why the whole earth
should not have been so. Perhaps the whole terrestrial globe was once
'one entire and perfect icicle.'" (From the privately printed "Life" of
Sir Charles Bunbury, edited by Lady Bunbury, Volume ii., page 334).) Her
letter is not very clear to me, and I do not understand what she means
by "to a height of more than three thousand feet." There are no erratic
boulders (to which I particularly attended ) in the low country round
Rio. It is possible or even probable that this area may have subsided,
for I could detect no evidence of elevation, or any Tertiary formations
or volcanic action. The Organ Mountains are from six to seven thousand
feet in height; and I am only a little surprised at their bearing the
marks of glacial action. For some temperate genera of plants, viz.,
Vaccinium, Andromeda, Gaultheria, Hypericum, Drosera, Habenaria, inhabit
these mountains, and I look at this almost as good evidence of a cold
period, as glacial action. That there are not more temperate plants can
be accounted for by the isolated position of these mountains. There are
no erratic boulders on the Pacific coast north of Chiloe, and but few
glaciers in the Cordillera, but it by no means follows, I think, that
there may not have been formerly gigantic glaciers on the eastern and
more humid side.
In the third edition of "Origin," page 403 (363/3. "Origin," Edition
VI., page 335, 1882. "Mr. D. Forbes informs me that he found in various
parts of the Cordillera, from lat. 13 deg W. to 30 deg S., at about the
height of twelve thousand feet, deeply furrowed rocks...and likewise
great masses of detritus, including grooved pebbles. Along this whole
space of the Cordillera true glaciers do not now exist, even at much
more considerable height. "), you will find a brief allusion, on
authority of Mr. D. Forbes, on the former much lower extension of
glaciers in the equatorial Cordillera. Pray also look at page 407 at
what I say on the nature of tropical vegetation (which I could now much
improve) during the Glacial period. (363/4. "During this, the coldest
period, the lowlands under the Equator must have been clothed with a
mingled tropical and temperate vegetation..." ("Origin," Edition VI.,
1882, page 338).)
I feel a strong conviction that soon every one will believe that the
whole world was cooler during the Glacial period. Remember Hooker's
wonderful case recently discovered of the identity of so many temperate
plants on the summit of Fernando Po, and on the mountains of Abyssinia.
(363/5. "Dr. Hooker has also lately shown that several of the plants
living in the upper parts of the lofty island of Fernando Po, and in
the neighbouring Cameroon Mountains, in the Gulf of Guinea, are closely
related to those on the mountains of Abyssinia, and likewise to those of
temperate Europe" (loc. cit., page 337).) I look at [it] as certain that
these plants crossed the whole of Africa from east to west during the
same period. I wish I had published a long chapter written in full, and
almost ready for the press, on this subject, which I wrote ten years
ago. It was impossible in the "Origin" to give a fair abstract.
My health is considerably improved, so that I am able to work nearly two
hours a day, and so make some little progress with my everlasting book
on domestic varieties. You will have heard of my sister Catherine's easy
death last Friday morning. (363/6. Catherine Darwin died in February
1866.) She suffered much, and we all look at her death as a blessing,
for there was much fear of prolonged and greater suffering. We are
uneasy about Susan, but she has hitherto borne it better than we could
have hoped. (363/7. Susan Darwin died in October 1866.)
Remember glacial action of Lebanon when you speak of no glacial action
in S. on Himalaya, and in S.E. Australia.
P.S.--I have been very glad to see Sir C. Bunbury's letter. (363/8. The
letter from Bunbury to Lyell, already quoted on this subject. Bunbury
writes: "There is nothing in the least NORTHERN, nothing that is not
characteristically Brazilian, in the flora of the Organ Mountains.") If
the genera which I name from Gardner (363/9. "Travels in the Interior
of Brazil," by G. Gardner: London, 1846.) are not considered by him as
usually temperate forms, I am, of course, silenced; but Hooker looked
over the MS. chapter some ten years ago and did not score out my remarks
on them, and he is generally ready enough to pitch into my ignorance
and snub me, as I often deserve. My wonder was how any, ever so few,
temperate forms reached the mountains of Brazil; and I supposed they
travelled by the rather high land and ranges (name forgotten) which
stretch from the Cordillera towards Brazil. Cordillera genera of plants
have also, somehow, reached the Silla of Caracas. When I think of
the vegetation of New Zealand and west coast of South America, where
glaciers now descend to or very near to the sea, I feel it rash to
conclude that all tropical forms would be destroyed by a considerably
cooler period under the Equator.
LETTER 364. TO C. LYELL. Down, Thursday, February 15th [1866].
Many thanks for Hooker's letter; it is a real pleasure to me to read his
letters; they are always written with such spirit. I quite agree that
Agassiz could never mistake weathered blocks and glacial action; though
the mistake has, I know, been made in two or three quarters of the
world. I have often fought with Hooker about the physicists putting
their veto on the world having been cooler; it seems to me as irrational
as if, when geologists first brought forward some evidence of elevation
and subsidence, a former Hooker had declared that this could not
possibly be admitted until geologists could explain what made the earth
rise and fall. It seems that I erred greatly about some of the plants on
the Organ Mountains. (364/1. "On the Organ Mountains of Brazil some few
temperate European, some Antarctic, and some Andean genera were found
by Gardner, which did not exist in the low intervening hot countries"
("Origin," Edition VI., page 336).) But I am very glad to hear about
Fuchsia, etc. I cannot make out what Hooker does believe; he seems to
admit the former cooler climate, and almost in the same breath to spurn
the idea. To retort Hooker's word |