[Enclosure]

Brunswick Me Jan^y 17/66 Mr Charles Darwin Dear Sir

I wish to lay before you some thought on the theory (or perhaps more properly supplementary to the theory) of the origin of man which you have done so much to elucidate and which has been christened with your name.⁶ My idea is that one branch of the human race originated in the vicinity of Borneo, migrated north & west untill improved by change of climate food crossings &c it arrived at the vicinity of the Black Sea—

It there meets the more enterprising of (or a selection from) the African branch who have found their way through the isthmus of Suez— The two branches mingle. The waters of the Nile the Danube the D⁠⟨⁠o⁠⟩⁠n⁷ &c containing the fertilizing matter of their respective regions here meet & mingle, and through their evaporations affect the climate, the plants & the inhabitants, who are also crossing the breeds the while— While this is going on I suppose the straits of Gibraltar to have been closed (and I understand that their appearance warrants or gives color to this supposition)

The Caspian Sea, receiving & holding an (entirely different drainage, of course assisted also, and the Arabian & Baltic Seas are not too far off to have some slight influence—

I suppose all this to have resulted in a Black Man in the right state to be affected by another influence—when, the Black & Mediteranean seas being low & their waters concentrated by drought, the boistereous Atlantic bursts through the pillars of Hercules & rushes clear up to the Black Sea, bearing through the Gulf stream a selection from an entire Hemisphere.⁸

This influence from the to them unknown world I suppose to have had bleaching & other qualities & to have resulted in the white man, or Adam. From Adam to Noah the breed was fixed as much as possible or expedient in Noah— The flood sweeps all away & Noah & his family have a clear field—⁹ Some of his progeny go back to Asia & Africa & under those influences breed back to a more or less extent, others migrating to Europe & continuing to receive the influence of the gulf stream & finding other better influences & perhaps a virgin soil have resulted in what they are.

I suppose a similar operation to have gone on on this continent between the waters & inhabitants of the valley of the Amazon & Missisippi &c in and around the gulf of Mexico, resulting in a race of beings similar to that produced by a similar combination in Europe. I suppose also that every thing material & immaterial in nature is differently charged as positive & negative or male & female, that this Hemisphere in this connection is male (ie the male preponderates) & in the other the female preponderates.

I do not suppose this operation of the gulf stream through the Mediteranean Sea to be an imitation of sexual intercourse— The resemblance is very striking however— It is a means well adapted to an end. And the similarity in the means is probably paralell with the similarity in the materials used & the object to be attained, and the different wombs you will perceive correspond with the organizations resulting. I have long considered the name of Monkey (Mankey) as significant, and in this connection, although it may seem childish, Portugal, Spain & the Fortress of Gibraltar held by England look suspicious.

Hellespont, Marmora, Bosphorous &c do not require a very vivid imagination to perceive the hint if we are looking for one.¹⁰ Caucus is not a bad synonym for what is supposed to have transpired on & around the Caucasian mountains and there is the plain bald unquestioned fact that here, in the vicinity of the Black & Caspian Seas, Man (not what man was made of or from) but Man himself was made.¹¹

There is man right where those tools would have made him if they did make him. Those tools could have made him I think, and in the very way in which God makes every thing which we know any thing about and there are even the signboards which (tho’ not absolutely necessary perhaps but convenient) we naturally expect to find on approaching a County Seat or similar place— And then & thus or similarly, I believe God did make him.

As intimated before I suppose this principle of opposites or (more properly perhaps) apposites to pervade all Nature, Government among the rest, that Monarchical & Democratical forms of government are both faulty, & both need an opposite as much as the male or female, in fact that they are one positive & the other negative or whatever you please to call it.

I believe that the Eastern continent or Hemisphere is and should be monarchically charged and that this Hemisphere is democratically charged. Two straight lines may always approach each other & never meet & thus I imagine that Monarchy & Democracy Good & Evil or any other two opposites may always approach each other, growing more & more like but never meeting or becoming the same.

Monarchy I conceive to be Adam and Democracy Eve or Adam or monarchy conseved or taken out of his rib.

God & Devil (Good & Evil) hold no feeble light on this Subject. Amazon & Mis Sippi & Miss Houri seem to be branded.¹² In fact as you near the focus every thing seems to tell—

This play upon words may seem puerile to you (and the whole may for ought I know) but the more I meditate upon it (and its a regular Mediteranaen Sea) the more I am convinced that there is something and a good deal too in it. I should be glad to hear from you on the subject either in the way of objection or any other way.

Of course it is a theory only and I do not undertake to prove it, otherwise than as it speaks for itself or as I may elucidate it.

Of course to carry out the Governmental part of the theory, as per the chart, the Eastern Hemisphere should be gathered together under one head, the western under another head, we should have one man & one woman who ought at once to get married and behave themselves like a good husband & wife give us peace & the millenium and all the good things which must follow in its train.

Yours respecty | Alex F. Boardman | Brunswick | Maine | USA