IN tE summer or early autumn of 1859, or of tedBritiserly Revie an advance copy of a neuralist Cerest and agreed t it , butfeared t t matter oo narroo attract a e a book about pigeons instead. “Everyone is interested in pigeons,” he observedhelpfully.

    EluralSelection, or tion of Favoured Races in truggle for Life  fifteen s edition of 1,250 copies sold out on t day. It  of print, and scarcely out of controversy, in all time since—not bad going for a man   for asingle impetuous decision to sail around try parson knoerest in earthworms.

    C Darto Midlands of England. , er of Josiatery fame.

    Darage of upbringing, but continually pained er academic performance. “You care for not sing, dogs, and rat-catco yourself and all your family,” e in a linet nearly al about ion o natural ory, for ried to study medicine at Edinburgy but couldn’t bear tnessing anoperation on an understandably distressed cics, ofcourse—left ly traumatized. ried laead, but found t insupportablydull and finally managed, more or less by default, to acquire a degree in divinity fromCambridge.

    A life in a rural vicarage seemed to a  of tempting offer. Dared to sail on tiallyas dinner company for tain, Robert FitzRoy, zRoy, okened depter,  FitzRoy’s first c got tzRoy’s preferred companion dropped out.

    From a ty-first-century perspective t striking joint feature e in ory: on tucky, Abraham Lincoln was born.

    extreme yout time of sailing, FitzRoy y-tty-two.

    FitzRoy’s formal assignment o c coastal ers, but o seek out evidence for a literal, biblical interpretation of creation. t Darrained for try ral to FitzRoy’s decision to  Darly proved to be not only liberal of vie less tedly devoted toCian fundamentals became a source of lasting friction bethem.

    Darime aboard o 1836, iveexperience of  also one of t trying. ain s zRoy  to fits of fury folloment. antly engaged in quarrels, some “bordering oninsanity,” as Darer recalled. Ocean voyages tended to become melancakings at t of times—tain of t a bullet t of lonely gloom—and FitzRoy came from a family inct.  Castlereag  tzRoy zRoy proved strangely unknowable.

    Darounded to learn upon t almost at onceFitzRoy married a young o  once ed at an attac or even mentioned her name.

    In every ot, riumpure enougo last a lifetime and accumulated a  to makeation and keep  trove of giant ancientfossils, including t Megato date; survived a letifully named Delpzroyi);conducted diligent and useful geological investigations t tion of coral atolls, coincidentally, t atolls could not form in less t  of anding attac to treme antiquity of earty-seven, urned er being awo days.  Englandagain.

    One t do on tion. For a start, evolution as a concept ribute to evolutionary principles in a poem of inspiredmediocrity called “temple of Nature” years before C  untiltion (ion gro to percolate t life is a perpetual struggle and t natural selection  Dar all organismscompeted for resources, and t e advantage  advantage to tinuously improve.

    It seems an a is an a it explained a great deal,and Daro devote o it. “upid of me not to  ofit!” t.  is a vie has beenechoed ever since.

    Interestingly, Dar use ttest” in any of ion for it). ter tion of On t Spencer in Principles of Biology in 1864.

    Nor did ion in print until tion of Origin (by s use oo o resist), preferring instead “descent ion.”

    Nor, above all, eresting diversity in tory asconventionally told (or at least as frequently remembered by many of us) is t Daro island, noticed t ted for exploiting local resources—t on one island beaks urdy ands and good for cracking nuts,  of crevices—and it  set o tper been created t ed themselves.

    In fact, ted t it  Dar. At timeof t of college and not yet an accomplisuralistand so failed to see t type. It alents. Unfortunately, in  noted oises.) It took years to sort t.

    Because of ts, and to sort tes and crates of ot  until 1842, six years after urn to England, t Daro sketc ts of o a 230-page“sketcer. And traordinary t es a decade and a ters. en ced nearly eigo ing an exive opus on barnacles (“I e a barnacle as noman ever did before,” andably, upon to strange disorders t left less, faint, and “flurried,” as  it. toms nearly alerrible nausea and generally also incorporatedpalpitations, migraines, exion, trembling, spots before tness of breat surprisingly, depression.

    tablis t romantic and pered possibilities is t ropical malady t e of a Bencion is t ion . Often y minutes at a stretcimes not t.

    Muc of ime ed to a series of increasingly desperate treatments—icy plunge batric c subjectedo small jolts of current. , seldom leaving , Dos upon moving to to erect a mirroroutside udy  ify, and if necessary avoid, callers.

    Dar o orm it es aiges of tural ory of Creationroused muco fury by suggesting t  es  tance of a divine creator. Anticipating tcry, taken careful steps to conceal ity,  from even  friends for t forty years. Some hor.

    Oted Prince Albert. In fact, ttis Cance to reveal icaldimension as ed from pulpits t Britain and far beyond, but also attracted a good dealof more sced nearly an entire issue—eigo pulling it to pieces. Even t. ion, attacked t thor was a friend.

    2Dar migill  for an alarmingblo arrived from t in tcontaining a friendly letter from a young naturalist named Alfred Russel allace and tof a paper, On tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from type,outlining a tural selection t o Dar jottings.

    Even some of triking coincidence,”

    Dared in dismay. “If allace  sketcten out in 1842,  ter s abstract.”

    allace didn’t drop into Dare as unexpectedly as is sometimes suggested.

    t  migerest. In tly   of species creation as erritory. “t note-book, ontion of  ies differ from eacten to allace some time earlier. “I am noion,”  really.

    In any case, allace failed to grasp rying to tell  ical to one t Darwo decades.

    Dar to preserve y,aking advantage of an innocent tip-off from a distant admirer. But if eppedaside, as gentlemanly conduct arguably required,  for a t ly propounded. allace’s t of aflas; Dar of years of careful, plodding, met. Itwas all crushingly unfair.

    to compound  son, also named Cracted scarletfever and ically ill. At t of te traction of ime to dasters to o step aside but noting t to do so  allever it may amount to, ing a summary of Darogettled on ing of ty, ime rugglingto find its o fas of scientific eminence. On July 1, 1858, Daro guess correctly. o be visiting Cion of Vestiges  appears t discuss it.

    and allace’s to t present. On ting, heir son.

    tation  evening—one of ty or so people in t tnessing tific  of tury, t. No discussionfollo attract mucice elseed tonly one person, a Professor on of Dublin, mentioned t and  all t  rue was old.”

    allace, still in tant East, learned of ter t, buto  all. oter as “Darytisrick Mattural selection—in fact, in t Darunately, Mattimberand Arboriculture,  by Dar by tire world.

    Mattter to Gardener’s C everyion, te for t no one neitly any oturalist, to a imberand Arboriculture.”

    allace continued for anoty years as a naturalist and t increasingly fell from scientific favor by taking up dubious interests sucualism and ty of life existing else, Darwin’s alone.

    Darormented by o  revealing t “like confessing a murder.” Apart from allelse,  deeply pained  to  onceexpanding  into a book-lengt An Abstract ofan Essay on ties tural Selection —a title so tepidand tentative t o issue just five once presented , and a sliging title, Murray reconsideredand increased tial print run to 1,250.

    On te commercial success, but raticalone. Dared tractable difficulties. It needed far more time to concede, and it ed by fossil evidence. ful critics, ransitional forms t inuously evolving, t to be lots ofintermediate forms scattered across t t.

    3In fact, t existed time after ofthe famous Cambrian explosion.

    3By coincidence, in 1861, at t of troversy, just sucurned up ure   it also eet  asingle discovery could hardly be considered conclusive.

    But noing t t  life and t   found it yet because, for  been preserved. It simply could not be otained. “t presentmust remain inexplicable; and may be truly urged as a valid argument against tertained,”  candidly, but o entertain an alternative possibility.

    By ion ed—inventively but incorrectly—t peroo clear to lay dos and thus had preserved no fossils.

    Even Dar friends roubled by tions.

    Adam Sedgaken our ofales in 1831, said tas poor conjecture. Even Lyell concluded gloomily: “Daroo far.”

    t. ence on s of geological time because ationist,  evolutionary cgradually but suddenly. Saltationists (tin for “leap”) couldn’taccept t complicated organs could ever emerge in sloages.  good, after all, is one-tent, only made sense if tate.

    t as  closely recalled a veryconservative religious notion first put for from design. Paley contended t if you found a pocket cantly perceivet it elligent entity. So it scomplexity s design. tion eentury,and it gave Darrouble too. “to tter to a friend. In t it “seems, I freely confess,absurd in t possible degree” t natural selection could produce sucrumentin gradual steps.

    Even so, and to tion of ers, Dar only insisted tall c in nearly every edition of Origin epped up t of timeo alloion to progress, ually,” according to tist and orian Jeffrey Scz, “Darvirtually all t t still remained among tural orians andgeologists.”

    Ironically, considering t Dared a mec become stronger or better or faster—in a ter—but gave noindication of  migtised an important fla. Dar any beneficial trait t arose in one generation o subsequentgenerations, trengthe species.

    Jenkin pointed out t a favorable trait in one parent  become dominant insucceeding generations, but in fact ed to a tumbler of er, you don’t make tronger, you make it  dilute solution into anoter, it becomes ill. In trait introduced by one parent ered do matings until it ceased to be apparent at all. t a recipefor c for constancy. Lucky flukes migime to time, but to bring everyto a stable mediocrity. Ifnatural selection o ernative, unconsidered mechanism was required.

    Unknoo Dariring monk named Gregor Mendel ion.

    Mendel o a er of trianempire in rayed observant provincial monk  ofnoticing some interesting traits of inance  s in tery’s kitc, Mendel rained scientist—udied pics at tz Pitute and ty of Vienna—and  scientific discipline to all ery at Brno ution. It y tradition of careful scientific investigation.

    Before embarking on s, Mendel spent ties of pea, to make sure true. timeassistants, edly bred and crossbred y ts. It e o take t exacting pains to avoid accidental cross-fertilization and to note every sligion in tems, and flowers. Mendel knew w he was doing.

    coined until 1913, in an Englisionary—t terms dominant and recessive.  ablis every seed contained tors” or “elemente,” as  oneand a recessive one—and tors, terns ofinance.

    ts ed into precise matical formulae. Altogeteigs, ts s onflos. If anytoo scientific in ed  tings of tural orySociety of Brno in 1865, t forty listened politely but s ter of great practical interest to manyof the members.

    o t SanistKarl-il al for ts.

    Unfortunately, N?geli failed to perceive tance of  Mendel try breeding ly did as N?geli suggested,but quickly realized t e features for studying ability.

    It  to  N?geli  read t all. Frustrated,Mendel retired from investigating ability and spent t of standing vegetables and studying bees, mice, and sunspots, among mucually.

    Mendel’s findings  quite as imes suggested. udyreceived a glory in tannica —tific t ted repeatedly in an important paper by t irely sank beloerline of scientific t t them.

    toget realizing it, Darietury. Dar all living ted, tultimately trace try to a single, common source,” o  y of o Dar o  to get in touc is knoo udied Focke’s influential paper s repeated references to Mendel’s  didn’tconnect to udies.

    tured in Dar, t  feature at all except as one passing allusion. Even so, it took no great leap ofimagination to see tions for  in Darbecame an immediate talking point.

    turday, June 30, 1860, at a meeting of tisionfor t of Science in Oxford. o attend by RobertCiges of tural ory of Creation, till unao t contentious tome. Dar. tingo turned a someto to  oryremarks on “tellectual Development of Europe Considered o the Viewsof Mr. Darwin.”

    Finally, to speak. ilberforce  is generally assumed) by t anti-Dars t end in uproar,accounts vary ly transpired. In t popular version, ilberforce,o tac to tless intended as a quip, but it came across as an icy co , urned to o myain relish.

    Otrembling ion. At all events, o an ape to someone o be a serious scientificforum. Suce inence, as  to ilberforce’soffice, and tantly collapsed in tumult. A Lady Breer fainted. RobertFitzRoy, Dary-five years before, , sing, “t topresent a paper on storms in y as ed MeteorologicalDepartment.) Interestingly, eacero ed ther.

    Darually make  in tof Man in 1871. tedsucion. t time albones from Germany and a feain fragments of jaedauties refused to believe even in tiquity. t of Man ogetroversial book, but by time of its appearance tableand its arguments caused mucir.

    For t part,  ofially on questions of natural selection.  amazingly longperiods picking tinizing tents in an attempt to understandinents, and spent years more studying the behavior of worms.

    One of s o play to t to amuse t to study ts on tion.  to realize ally importanto soil fertility. “It may be doubted  a part in tory of te in er, tion of Vegetable Mould tion of orms (1881), rivances by isilised byInsects (1862), Expressions of tions in Man and Animals (1872), s first day, ts of Cross and Self Fertilization in tableKingdom (1876)—a subject t came improbably close to Mendel’s oattaining anyts—and  book, t inPlants. Finally, but not least, ed muc to studying tter of private interest to ed t certain pal frailties among y in ree.

    Daren ime, but never for On tof Man. y besto  evolutionary ty o  embracing ions. ed, tminster Abbey—next to Neer.

    Dar really gain ance until tain eur, tion  came someists ely in Europe rediscovered Mendel’s aneously. It c to claim Mendel’sinsig a rival made it noisily clear t t really lay tenmonk.

    t ready, but not quite, to begin to understand   is fairly amazing to reflect t at tietury, and for some years beyond, t scientific minds in t actuallytell you where babies came from.

    And t science  an end.