The relation between Darwin and Wallace in regard to priority of discovery is one of the finest things in the whole history of science. There was no jealousy, no bitterness, no acrimony, but instead a full recognition of each others’ achievements, and a sympathetic understanding which ripened into a helpful and unbroken friendship. Wallace’s statement of the matter long after Darwin’s death, is as noble in its unselfishness as words can make it: ‘But what is often forgotten by the press and the public is that the idea occurred to Darwin in 1838 ... nearly twenty years earlier than to myself, and that during the whole twenty years he had been laboring collecting evidence from the vast mass of literature of biology, of horticulture, and of agriculture.... Such being the facts of the case, I should have had no cause for complaint if the respective shares of Darwin and myself ... had been henceforth estimated as being roughly proportioned to the time we had each bestowed upon it ... that is to say, as twenty years to one week.’[407] Darwin’s summary, more general, is equally worthy of both: ‘I hope it is a satisfaction to you to reflect—and very few things in my life have been more satisfactory to me—that we have never felt any jealousy towards each other, though in one sense rivals. I believe that I can say this of myself with truth, and I am absolutely sure that it is true of you.’[408] The first promulgation of the Darwinian ideas, with those of Wallace, was therefore made in July, 1858. In the following year, November, 1859, ‘The Origin of Species’ was published. Darwin himself regarded this book as a mere preliminary sketch, requiring to be supported and buttressed by confirmatory evidence of all sorts. But it at once overwhelmed the world, and has always been looked upon since as the cardinal statement of the theory. As Huxley said of it, ‘It is doubtful if any single book, except the “Principia,” ever worked so great and so rapid a revolution in science, or made so deep an impression on the general mind.’[409] And innumerable quotations could be drawn from other sources to the same effect. III