Darwin, His Publisher and Science Progress (Charles Darwin‪)‬

The article that begins this special number, by David McClay, throws considerable light on Darwin's friendships and character, and is of great interest. Many will not have realized the debt that Darwin felt towards Lyell. It is clear from David's article that Lyell's ideas on the relation between geological changes and time greatly influenced Darwin with respect to his theories on variation and natural selection, and with his characteristic generosity, Darwin makes his indebtedness clear and this led to a close friendship between the two men. Another interesting point clear from McClay's article is that in spite of his amazing ideas and continuing influence on biology, Darwin was a very human man, with unexpected faults with respect to both serious issues and trivial (humorous?) ones. On one serious issue, it is clear that Darwin was obsessive about his health, often consulting physicians, and never seeming happy about how he was feeling, "being continually bothered about illness; health worries seemed only rarely to leave him". One would have guessed that some of the symptoms point to imagined illness, but Campbell et al. in the article which follows that by McClay, clearly suggest otherwise!