A History of the British Stalk-Eyed Crustacea

London: John van Voorst, 1853. First edition.

DESCRIPTION OF CRUSTACEANS BY ZOOLOGIST WHO PRESIDED OVER THE PRESENTATION OF NATURAL SELECTION BY DARWIN AND WALLACE IN 1858.

14x23 cm hardcover, green cloth binding, gilt title to spine, contemporary ink signature of Henry K. Jordan top of half-title, i-lxv, 386 pp, 4 pp publisher's list. Dedicated to Professor Richard Owen, the Faithful and Unchanged Friend of Many Years, 174 superb wood engraved illustrations and vignettes of the seashore and the sea. Corners bumped, wear to cover edges, scattered light foxing, pencil notations to rear endpapers (presumably by Henry Jordan). Very good minus in custom archival mylar cover.

THOMAS BELL (1792-1880) was an English zoologist and surgeon. He was a personal friend to Darwin, although hostile to his theories of man's evolution, and as President of the Linnean society chaired the meeting on 30 June 1858, when Darwin and Wallace presented their controversial papers on selection and the origin of species. He combined two careers, becoming Professor of Zoology at King's College London in 1836 and lecturing on anatomy at Guy's Hospital. He became a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons in 1844. As President of the Linnean Society he chaired the meeting on 1 July 1858 at which Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace first published their theories on natural selection in the joint presentation of papers On the Tendency of Species to form Varieties; and on the Perpetuation of Varieties and Species by Natural Means of Selection. He apparently disapproved, and in his annual presidential report presented in May 1859 wrote that "The year which has passed has not, indeed, been marked by any of those striking discoveries which at once revolutionize, so to speak, the department of science on which they bear".