Note 8 — Chapter XVIII · THE COLLABORATORS: (CONTINUED)

Souvenirs, II., p. 160. He makes this declaration in respect of an error which he had incorrectly attributed to Erasmus Darwin, the grandfather of the famous Charles Darwin, on the faith of an unfaithful translation due to the entomologist Lacordaire. The mistake, which is really Lacordaire’s, not Erasmus Darwin’s, consisted in confusing the Sphex with a common Wasp. Charles Darwin, having informed Fabre that his grandfather had said “a wasp,” the French naturalist immediately inserted this correction in a note, in the second volume of the Souvenirs, which I had not yet come across when I cited the passage in question. I can therefore say with M. Fabre: “May this note amend, within the proper limits, the assertions which I made in all good faith.” ↑