I anticipate for it an enormous
sale, and shall read it with intense interest, although I expect to find
in it more to differ from than in any of your other books. Some
reasonable and reasoning opponents are now taking the field. I have been
writing a little notice of Murphy's "Habit and Intelligence," which,
with much that is strange and unintelligible, contains some very acute
criticisms and the statement of a few real difficulties. Another article
just sent me from the _Month_ contains some good criticism. How
incipient organs can be useful is a real difficulty, so is the
independent origin of similar complex organs; but most of his other
points, though well put, are not very formidable. I am trying to begin a
little book on the Distribution of Animals, but I fear I shall not make
much of it from my idleness in collecting facts.
I shall make it a popular sketch first, and, if it succeeds, gather
materials for enlarging it at a future time. If any suggestion occurs to
you as to the kind of maps that would be best, or on any other essential
point, I should be glad of a hint.
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