Page:Carroll Lane Fenton - Darwin and the Theory of Evolution.djvu/56

 Rh regretted that the abundance of magazine illustrations and photographs made his face known throughout England and Scotland. Even when he went to a water-cure establishment for a relief from illness he could not escape being gazed on, pointed at, and whispered of, as the great Mr. Darwin, who had done many fine things, but who nevertheless held the wicked belief that man was descended from apes and monkeys.

This modesty, coupled with an almost boundless generosity, made him almost a patron saint to those younger botanists and zoologists whose work lay in the same channels as his. He would learn of their work, and give them praise; he would ask for small favors and reproach himself for causing them so much trouble. Perhaps the next week he would take the work of one of these beginners, edit or even rewrite it, and then spend many of his precious work hours seeing the paper through the whole tedious process of publication. Of course, such acts put the enthusiasm of the younger men at the highest pitch, and gave them confidence in the value of the work they were doing. They would search their hardest for new facts to record for Darwin, and new specimens to send to him, even from such remote regions as South Africa and India. They felt that they were being cf some use in the world of science, and they took long strides forward on the path that leads to achievement.

All this does not mean that Darwin was without critical ability, or inclined to accept everything as good. On the other hand he grasped