[572]
struggle for life, natural selection, the age of the world, races of men, biblical dates, apes, and gorillas, etc., and the last duel has been between Owen and Huxley on the anatomical distinction of the pithecoid brain compared with that of man. Theological controversy has also been rife, stirred up by the ‘Essays and Reviews,’ of which you have no doubt heard much.
For myself, I have been busy preparing, in conjunction with Huxley, another decade of fossil fishes, all from the old red of Scotland. . . . Enniskillen is quite well.
He is now at Lyme Regis. . . .
At about this time the Copley Medal was awarded to Agassiz, a distinction which was the subject of cordial congratulation from his English friends.
From Sir Roderick Murchison.
Belgrave square, March, 1862.
my dear Agassiz,—Your letter of the 14th February was a great surprise to me. I blamed myself for not writing you sooner than I did on the event which I had long been anxious to see realized; but I took it for granted that you had long before received the official announcement from the foreign secretary 