WCP5037

Parkstone, Dorset.

Jan^y 20th. 1892

Dear Mr Westermarck,

Many thanks for your letter & your kind offer to send me some views of your scenery which will be very acceptable.

I am very glad to see that Macmillan has brought out your book¹ in such a handsome volume, and I trust that it is selling satisfactorily and that it will notwithstanding its peculiar subject and somewhat repulsive details bring you in a moderate return [2] besides bare reputation.

I quite thank with you that Prof. Robertson Smith's criticism is altogether erroneous,— but then he evidently has not grasped the wide-reaching principle of natural selection as you have done. For what want of this he does not see that in the case he refers to individual variations are all that are required to bring the "group" into existence, and thus his criticism that you postulate the thing to be explained falls to the ground. For naturalists [3] the very objection of Prof. R. Smith that you assume the laws of society (as regards marriage) to be in many cases "formulated instincts" will seem the greatest merit of your book.

It is so many year since I read much of Anthropology that I made a very stupid mistake in naming Prof. E. Tylor among those who had adopted the views of McLennan, &c. I have written to Macmillan to insert an "Erratum" slip in all copies on hand, and to omit his name from any reprint. I still differ from you on the [4] sexual origin of dress. I do not know if any of your critics have touched on this. It is however not a very important matter.

Believe me | Yours very faithfully

Alfred R. Wallace [signature]

P.S. Your facts about the Foula intermarriages are very interesting. The community being so small there can be no adequate selection,— & this would also be the case among the small tribes of most savages.

A.R.W.