The Effects of Cross and Self Fertilisation in the Vegetable Kingdom.

London: John Murray, 1876. First edition. Fine. Octavo (20 cm); viii, 482 pages. Advertisements for other works of the author on the verso of the title, 3-line errata slip tipped in prior to Chapter One. Original cloth. Owner's name in ink and old bookseller notations in pencil on front free endpaper. Else a fine copy in remarkably fresh condition. Reference: Freeman, 1249.

In his eye-opening re-appraisal of Darwin's botanical books, Oliver Sachs wrote that Darwin's botanical studies were "engines of war, great missles of evidence lobbed at the skeptics of his theory of natural seledtion" (The River of Consciousness). Sachs observes that the botanical studies are "even more overwhelming" than the author's magnum opus, The Origin of Species, in its presentation of natural seledtion as the basic fact of evolution.