the missing factor to explain the origin of species. I asked him if he thought it sufficiently
important, to show it to Sir Charles Lyell, who had thought so highly of my former paper.According to Wallace’s diary his letter was despatched on 9 March 1858 when a
Dutch cargo vessel arrived in Ternate on its regular run around the Moluccas. He paid
the captain the amount necessary to transfer the letter to Singapore, from where it was
transferred to a British ship bound for Southampton and then delivered to Darwin via
the mail from London, where on 18 July one of his servants would have paid the two
shillings due in England for unfranked overseas mail.
Would Wallace’s idea be as new to Darwin as it was to him? Wallace knew that it
would take three to four months for his letter to reach Darwin and around the same
time for him to receive a response. There was no point in him hanging around Ternate
and, besides, there was the large island of Papua New Guinea to explore.
Alfred Russel Wallace –’Letter from Ternate’ 165