The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1895-03-31
Ladies' Literary Club.

The meeting of the last or fifth
Friday of the month was presidents
day with the Ladies' Literary club, and
was of unusual interest.
The main feature of the afternoon
was lecture by Prof Whiting. of the
University of Utah. on the subject of
scientific researches of the present age
in general and those of Alfred Russell
Wallace in particular. The professor
said in part:
There is a decided tendency for the
intellect of any given age to flow in
single direction. and although our age
has been graced by grand galaxy of
lyric poets. it is prominently scien-
tif1c age, and the real leaders OF
thought have been the scientific men.
Among these may be named Darwin,
Huxley. Wallace, Mivart, Allen, Jor-
dan. LIE Cart. Spencer. and F'islIe. The
leaders of thought, like the leaders Of
an army, show the way in which the
masses are moving. Where the leaders
stand today, the masses will stand to-
morrow. Alfred Russell Wallace was
born in England in 1922. After a col
lege course he went to South America
in 1S4S, where he remained four years
making observations which were of
the greatest use to him in his future
work. The collections which he made
while in the valleys of the Orinoco
and Amazon rivers were unfortunately
destroyed by fire. Two years after his
return to England were employed in
writing out the copious notes he had
made while on his travels.
In 1854 Mr.. Wallace started for the
East Indian archipelago. where he
spent eight years in travel. study and
in making collections. No wonder that
while he was in the midst of the Won
derful profusion of life which char
acterises the tropics the great problem
of the origin of species presented it.
self to him. While he was striving to
solve this problem in the wilds Of
Borneo and Java Darwin was work
ing on the same problem in his quiet
home. Darwin house. near London.
Neither knew of the work of the other.
but both came to the same conclusion.
though by different roads. Mr.. Wal
laces first statement of his views were
contained in a letter written to Mr..
Darwin in 1858. This letter. which con-
tanned Mr.. Wallace's views, was SO
nearly like a paper which Mr.. OAR
win had just finished that Darwin was
at first inclined to suppress his own
paper. but yielding to the judgment of
his friends he presented both papers
to the August meeting of the Linnaean
society in 1858. Aside from his valuable
contributions to evolutionary thought
and philosophy, Mr.. Wallace has made
valuable contributions to our knowl-
edge of the distribution of life on the
globe and also to our knowledge of
island life. Although he is now an old
man he is giving much thought and at
tention to social problems. and many
of his suggestions indicate that his
mind is as clear and vigorous as when
he aided in the epoch making work Of
establishing the truth Of modern evo-
lutionary views.
Following this Mrs. Plummer read
James Whitcomb Riley's ''Armazindy'
and the "Slumber Song"
The concluding business of the after
noon was the election of Mrs. La
Barthe as the representative of the
Ladies' Literary club to the convention
of the Utah Federation of Woman
clubs" to be held in Ogden on May %
and %.
The chairman was unable to make
full announcement of next weeks pro-
gramme. Mrs. Morse has kindly con-
scented to address the ladies on the
subject Of Scientific Cleaning"