Presented by Adam Douglas, Senior Rare Book Specialist at Peter Harrington.
The first published statement of the theory of evolution in its original journal appearance. Following his return from his voyage aboard the Beagle, during which he had made the observations and gathered the specimens that would provide the data for his groundbreaking conclusions, Charles Darwin spent more than two decades formulating his theory. He was near completion of his great work On the Origin of Species when he was sent a manuscript on species change by the young naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace. It read much like an abstract of the book he was still compiling. In a compromise that would give both of the scientists a measure of priority, it was agreed that Wallace's paper and some of Darwin's writings showing his own discovery of natural selection would be read at the same Linnean Society meeting, on 1 July 1858.
The journal combines two contributions by Darwin with one by Wallace. Following the introduction by Charles Lyell and Joseph Hooker is "Extract from an unpublished work on Species by C. Darwin, consisting of a portion of a Chapter entitled 'On the Variation of Organic Beings in a state of Nature; on the Natural Means of Selection; on the Comparison of Domestic Races and true Species'" (pp. 46–50). This is followed by "Abstract of a Letter from C. Darwin, Esq., to Prof. Asa Gray, Boston, U.S., dated Down, September 5th, 1857" (pp. 50–53). Finally comes Wallace's contribution, "On the Tendency of Varieties to depart indefinitely from the Original Type" (pp. 53–62).
This printing of the Darwin–Wallace paper is one of “five different forms in which the original edition can be found, but they are all from the same setting of type. Four of these are the results of the publishing customs of Linnean Society of London”, in which the Journal was initially issued to the Fellows of the Society in different coloured wrappers, depending on whether they subscribed to the zoological or botanical parts of the Journal alone, or both parts together: for those who took the Zoology part, it was issued in pink wrappers; for the Botany part, in green wappers; and for both parts together, in blue wrappers, as seen in the present copy. The fourth form was its publication in the annual volume of the Journal using reserved stock, and the fifth form was the authors’ offprint (Freeman, p. 71).
