Note 182 — Chapter XII · THE PUBLICATION OF THE 'ORIGIN OF SPECIES.'

A letter of Dec. 14, gives a good example of the manner in which some naturalists received and understood it. "Old J. E. Gray of the British Museum attacked me in fine style: 'You have just reproduced Lamarck's doctrine, and nothing else, and here Lyell and others have been attacking him for twenty years, and because you (with a sneer and laugh) say the very same thing, they are all coming round; it is the most ridiculous inconsistency, &c. &c.'"