What was the actual sequence of events leading up to the 1 July 1858 Linnean Society reading of Wallaces and Darwins writings on natural selection?
There are still some unanswered questions here, but we think we know at least the following. In February of 1858, while on the island of Ternate (or quite more likely on the nearby island of Gilolo, as McKinney 1972 first claimed) suffering from a malarial episode, Wallace conceived of the notion of natural selection. Within days, as soon as he was well enough to make an extended effort, he completed setting the idea down in essay form (S43). Shortly thereafter he sent this, apparently with a cover letter, to Darwin (both the letter and the original draft of the essay have been lost). Darwin, he knew, was interested in the “species question,” and Wallace hoped he would bring the work to the attention of his friend Sir Charles Lyell, the famous geologist. Wallace did not ask for any assistance in getting the paper published but, given the meagre evidence available, it seems unlikely that he specifically asked that it not be published. Darwin apparently received the essay on 17 June 1858
