Down but not out

By his mid-forties, Darwin had established his scientific reputation, was married with a young family and had built on the solid connections that came with his and his wife's well-known middle class families. 'He was one of the kindest and truest men that it was ever my good fortune to know,' said his influential scientific colleague, Thomas Huxley. With no need to seek employment, Darwin took his family from London 25 miles out into the country where he could pursue his last and overriding goal – gathering evidence for his theory of natural selection. He knew it would be extremely difficult but essential if people were to be convinced by his ideas. Darwin moved to Down House in Downe in Kent (Darwin would have no truck with the post office's decision to add the extra 'e'). There he was comfortably settled with his wife Emma, and their children and, in spite of many bouts of bad health, 'my life goes on like clockwork and I am fixed on the spot where I shall end it', he wrote. But one morning in 1858 – the point where Janet Browne's new volume of biography takes up the tale from its 1995 predecessor, Voyaging, Darwin got infinitely more than he expected in a package from the East Indies. He opened an envelope to find a statement of his theory. The naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace had hit on the idea of natural selection for himself. Darwin was stunned. 'I never saw a more striking coincidence,' he moaned. Natural selection had occurred to a couple of others before Darwin and Wallace, but its significance had passed them by. Darwin's greatness lay in the mass of evidence and argument he had already built around the idea which he wished to expand. Wallace could never have achieved such a synthesis, as Wallace himself was the first to insist. While Darwin could see no other honorable course but to forward Wallace's paper for publication, his friends had other ideas. They implored Darwin to produce a summary of his views that could be published alongside Wallace's paper. He was finally persuaded and the two papers were presented to the Linnean Society. As was customary, the papers appeared in alphabetical order by author, so Darwin's came first. Darwin's friends had got what they wanted in a way that appeared honorable. Darwin was, however, still worried about how Wallace might Darwin's …