WAL'LACE, ALFRED RUSSEL An English naturalist and philosopher. Ile was born January S, 1822, at Usk, in .Alonmouthshire, and fitted himself for work as a surveyor and engineer. then became English master in the Collegiate School at Leicester. Wallace, already interested in botany and insects, was greatly aroused by Darwin's Journal, and other books of the period. Early in 1S-18 he sailed with 11. W. Bates(q.v.)for Parul. In 1850 Bates. and Wallace parted company, finding it more convenient to explore separate districts and collect independ ently, Wallace taking the northern parts and tributaries of the Amazon. Ile returned to Eng land in 1852, but his collection and notes were lost by shipwreck. Travels on the mazon and Rio Negro (1853) is a popular• account of these experiences. In 1S54 Wallace went to the Ala layan Archipelago, where he traveled and col lected for eight years from 3lalaeca to New Guinea. He studied the ethnological relations of this island world, collected the vocabularies of 75 native dialects, and made numerous meas urements of the aboriginal crania, besides study ing the habits of the orang-outang and the birds of paradise.
Wallace during his residence at Sarawak wrote in February. 1855, an essay On the Lame Which Ilas Regulated the Introduction of New Species, which was published in September. 1855, though he remarks that ten years previous the idea of such a law suggested itself to him. But beyond vaguely stating that in the method of peopling of the earth the proeess was gradnal, and that no new creation was formed widely differ ing from anything before existin, the essay only shows that its author was keenly alive to a search for the causes of evolution. lint light was shed upon the subject by Malthus's Essay on Population; and it w•as by reading this sugges tion that Wallace. like Darwin, hit upon the doc trine of natural selection (q.v.). In February, 1858, while at Ternate, he wrote his famous essay On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely from the Original Type. it led to the publication of Darwin's preliminary essay, and the two papers were published in the Proceed 118 of the Lineman Society of London for Au gust, 1858. In this essay Wallace discusses the nature of varieties, the struggle for existence, the law of perpetuation of species, useful and useless variations, and the partial reversion of domesticated varieties, although lie does not use the term 'natural selection,' which we owe to Darwin. Wallace did no work in the anatomy,
embrcology, and morphology of animals, and but little systematic work, but his contributions to hinnotnics, o• the relations of animal life to the world around it, were numerous and important.
To Wallace we are indebted for a comprehen sive and epoc•h-making work in zofigeography. Strongly inclined to speculation, he gave in his Tropical Nature (1878) and Island Life many valuable suggestions regarding the effect of geological and climatic changes on animal life. His simple and uncritical nature is shown by the interest he took in spiritualism, and he was apparently, for a while, at least, a believer in miracles and spirit-manifestations. This ten deney led him to deny that man's moral and spiritual nature has, like his physical being, been evolved by a natural process. He also became a student of sociology and was president of the Land Nationalization Society, holding that the State should own the soil. These views did not enhance his reputation, which will mainly rest on his discovery of natural selection. His native amiability and high-mindedness of chau•acter were conspicuously shown by his rare self-abne gation of any for the discovery of natural selection, and by Ids uninterrupted friendship with Darwin. During the latter part of his life Wallace lived in a rural part of England enjoy ing a very moderate pension the Govern ment. bestowed in recognition of his work" in natural history.
Wallace's most important works, and those containing his theoretical views, are, besides the 1,~5S essay, his epoch-making papcu. "On the Phenomenon of Variation and Geographical Dis tribution as Illustrated by the Papilionid:e of the Malayan 'Region," published in the Transac tions of the Liana an Society of London 11805); ('ontributions to the Theory of Vatvral Selection (157(1); The Malay Archipclayo (1509 ) The ilco(raphicell Di.t•tribution of ,Lnimais (15711) ; Tropicui Nut arc I 1875) : /shim/ Life 11880) ; Darwinism (1559). Other works Ore: Miracles and Modern Spiritualism (1573): Lund \a tionali.ation: Its and Its dims( 1882); Justralia and Yea' Zealand (1893); Studies. Scientific anti Sor•ial II:10(1); Man's Place in the Universe (1903).