"1. Extracts from a MS. work on species, by Mr. Darwin, which was sketched in 1839 and copied in 1844, when the copy was read by Dr. Hooker, and its contents afterward communicated to Sir Charles Lyell. The first part is devoted to _The Variation of Organic Beings under Domestication and in their Natural State_; and the second chapter of that part, from which we propose to read to the Society the extracts referred to, is headed _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_. "2. An abstract of a private letter addressed to Professor Asa Gray, of Boston, U.S., in October, 1857, by Mr. Darwin, in which he repeats his views, and which shows that these remained unaltered from 1839 to 1857. "3. An essay by Mr. Wallace, entitled _On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type_. This was written at Ternate in February, 1858, for the perusal of his friend and correspondent, Mr. Darwin, and sent to him with the expressed wish that it should be forwarded to Sir Charles Lyell, if Mr. Darwin thought it sufficiently novel and interesting. So highly did Mr. Darwin appreciate the value of the views therein set forth that he proposed, in a letter to Sir Charles Lyell, to obtain Mr. Wallace's consent to allow the essay to be published as soon as possible. Of this step we highly approved, provided Mr. Darwin did not withhold from the public, as he was strongly inclined to do (in favor of Mr. Wallace), the memoir which he had himself written on the same subject, and which, as before stated, one of us had perused in 1844, and the contents of which we had both of us been privy to for many years. "On representing this to Mr. Darwin, he gave us permission to make what use we thought proper of his memoir, etc.; and in adopting our present course, of presenting it to the Linnæan Society, we have explained to him that we are not solely considering the relative claims to priority of himself and his friend, but the interests of science generally; for we feel it to be desirable that views founded on a wide deduction from facts, and matured by years of reflecting, should constitute at once a goal from which others may start; and that, while the scientific world is waiting for the appearance of Mr. Darwin's complete work, some of the leading results of his labours, as well as those of his able correspondent, should together be laid before the public. "We have the honour to be yours very obediently, Charles Lyell, Jos. D. Hooker."