Meantime, on the continent of Europe and over-sea in America, the Darwinian theory was being hotly debated and warmly defended. France, coldly sceptical and critical, positive rather than imaginative in matters of science, and little prone by native cast of mind to the evolutionary attitude, stood aloof to a great extent from the onward course of the general movement. Here and there, to be sure, a Gaudry or a Ribot, a Delboeuf or a De Candolle (the two latter a Liège Belgian and a Genevan Swiss) might heartily throw himself into the new ideas, and contribute whole squadrons of geological or botanical fact to the final victory. Yet, as a whole, the dry and cautious French intelligence, ever inclined to a scientific opportunism, preferred for the moment to stand by expectant and await the result of the European consensus. But philosophical Germany, on the other hand, beaming enthusiasm from its myriad spectacles, eagerly welcomed the novel ideas, and proclaimed from the housetops the evolutionary faith as a main plank in the rising platform of the newly-roused Kulturkampf. Fritz Müller began with all the ardour of a fresh convert to collect his admirable 'Facts for Darwin;' his brother Hermann sat down with indomitable patience, like the master's own, to watch the ceaseless action of the bees and butterflies in the fertilisation of flowers. Rütimeyer applied the Darwinian principles to the explanation of mammalian relationships, and Haeckel set to work upon his vast reconstructive 'History of Creation,' a largely speculative work which, with all its faults, distinctly carried forward the evolutionary impulse, and set fresh researchers working upon new lines, to confirm or to disprove its audacious imaginings. In America, Asa Gray gave to the young creed the high authority of his well-known name, and Chauncey Wright helped it onward on the road with all the restrained force of his singular and oblique but powerful and original personality. If Agassiz and Dawson still hesitated, Fiske and Youmans were ardent in the faith. If critical Boston put up its eye-glass doubtfully, Chicago and St. Louis were ready for conversion. Everywhere Darwin and Darwinism became as household words; it was the singular fate of the great prophet of evolution, alone almost among the sons of men, to hear his own name familiarly twisted during his own lifetime into a colloquial adjective, and to see the Darwinian theory and the errors of Darwinism staring him in the face a hundred times a day from every newspaper and every periodical.