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Marchant, James

"Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 1"


[111] June 22, 1876, p. 165 _et seq._
[112] "The Origin of Species and Genera."
[113] "Island Life."
[114] In "My Life" (ii. 12-13) Wallace writes; "With this came seven
foolscap pages of notes, many giving facts from his extensive reading
which I had not seen. There were also a good many doubts and suggestions
on the very difficult questions in the discussion of the causes of the
glacial epochs. Chapter XXIII., discussing the Arctic element in South
Temperate floras, was the part he most objected to, saying, 'This is
rather too speculative for my old noddle. I must think that you overrate
the importance of new surfaces on mountains and dispersal from mountain
to mountain. I still believe in alpine plants having lived on the
lowlands and in the southern tropical regions having been cooled during
glacial periods, and thus only can I understand character of floras on
the isolated African mountains. It appears to me that you are not
justified in arguing from dispersal to oceanic islands to mountains. Not
only in latter cases currents of sea are absent, but what is there to
make birds fly direct from one alpine summit to another? There is left
only storms of wind, and if it is probable or possible that seeds may
thus be carried for great distances, I do not believe that there is at
present any evidence of their being thus carried more than a few miles.


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