F. You are right. But a man of science may be a man of other things
besides science, and though he may have, and ought to have no heart
during a scientific investigation, yet when he has once come to a
conclusion he may be hearty enough in support of it, and in his other
capacities may be of as warm a temperament as even you can desire.
C. I tell you I do not like the book.
F. May I catechise you a little upon it?
C. To your heart's content.
F. Firstly, then, I will ask you what is the one great impression
that you have derived from reading it; or, rather, what do you think
to be the main impression that Darwin wanted you to derive?
C. Why, I should say some such thing as the following - that men are
descended from monkeys, and monkeys from something else, and so on
back to dogs and horses and hedge-sparrows and pigeons and cinipedes
(what is a cinipede?) and cheesemites, and then through the plants
down to duckweed.
F. You express the prevalent idea concerning the book, which as you
express it appears nonsensical enough.
C. How, then, should you express it yourself?
F. Hand me the book and I will read it to you through from beginning
to end, for to express it more briefly than Darwin himself has done
is almost impossible.
