Letter to Alfred Newton, by Alfred Russel Wallace

Alfred Russel Wallace : Alfred Wallace : A. R. Wallace :
Russel Wallace : Alfred Russell Wallace (sic)

Letter to Alfred Newton (S707af: 1870/1921)

Editor Charles H. Smith's Note: An 1870 letter to Alfred Newton printed in 1921 in Alfred Newton; Professor of Comparative Anatomy Cambridge University 1866-1907 by A. F. R. Wollaston. Original pagination indicated within double brackets. To link directly to this page, connect with: http://people.wku.edu/charles.smith/wallace/S707AF.htm

[[p. 296]] London, Jan. 18, 1870

Dear Newton,

Can you inform me if there is any canal you know of in your part of the country with a straight piece (without locks) five or six miles long, or any piece of water of that extent? I have undertaken (for a heavy wager) to prove by measurement the rotundity of the earth, to one of those strange phenomena who [[p. 297]] do not believe in it and who is willing to pay to be enlightened.

"Will you also give me your advice on another point? I am about to publish all my papers which bear upon Natural Selection, etc., in a volume. I should like an attractive title, but will not have a misleading one. I have at present fixed upon "Contributions to the Theory of Natural Selection. A Series of Essays," as exactly expressing what the book will be. Macmillan has a dislike to the word Contributions, and wants me to call it "Essays on Natural Selection," or "On Natural Selection; a Series of Essays." But these indicate too much a complete work on a definite subject to please me.

Do you think my title will do, or can you suggest anything quite different?

Yours very faithfully,
Alfred R. Wallace.

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