Editing Alfred Russel Wallace (section)

=== Financial struggles ===

In the late 1860s and 1870s, Wallace was very concerned about the financial security of his family. While he was in the Malay Archipelago, the sale of specimens had brought in a considerable amount of money, which had been carefully invested by the agent who sold the specimens for Wallace. On his return to the UK, Wallace made a series of bad investments in railways and mines that squandered most of the money, and he found himself badly in need of the proceeds from the publication of ''The Malay Archipelago''.{{sfn|Slotten|2004|pp=265–267}}

Despite assistance from his friends, he was never able to secure a permanent salaried position such as a curatorship in a museum. To remain financially solvent, Wallace worked grading government examinations, wrote 25 papers for publication between 1872 and 1876 for various modest sums, and was paid by Lyell and Darwin to help edit some of their works.{{sfn|Slotten|2004|pp=299–300}}

In 1876, Wallace needed a £500 advance from the publisher of ''The Geographical Distribution of Animals'' to avoid having to sell some of his personal property.{{sfn|Slotten|2004|p=325}} Darwin was very aware of Wallace's financial difficulties and lobbied long and hard to get Wallace awarded a government pension for his lifetime contributions to science. When the £200 annual pension was awarded in 1881, it helped to stabilise Wallace's financial position by supplementing the income from his writings.{{sfn|Slotten|2004|pp=361–364}}