268 ON THE ORIGIN OF SPECIES 



It should not be forgotten, that at the present day, 

 with perfect specimens for examination, two forms can 

 seldom be connected by intermediate varieties and thus 

 proved to be the same species, until many specimens 

 have been collected from many places ; and in the 

 case of fossil species this could rarely be effected by 

 palaeontologists. We shall, perhaps, best perceive the 

 improbability of our being enabled to connect species 

 by numerous, fine, intermediate, fossil links, by asking 

 ourselves whether, for instance, geologists at some 

 future period will be able to prove, that our different 

 breeds of cattle, sheep, horses, and dogs have descended 

 from a single stock or from several aboriginal stocks ; 

 or, again, whether certain sea -shells inhabiting the 

 shores of North America, which are ranked by some 

 conchologists as distinct species from their European 

 representatives, and by other conchologists as only 

 varieties, are really varieties or are, as it is called, 

 specifically distinct. This could be effected only by 

 the future geologist discovering in a fossil state numerous 

 intermediate gradations ; and such success seems to me 

 improbable in the highest degree. 



Geological research, though it has added numerous 

 species to existing and extinct genera, and has made 

 the intervals between some few groups less wide than 

 they otherwise would have been, yet has done scarcely 

 anything in breaking down the distinction between 

 species, by connecting them together by numerous, 

 tine, intermediate varieties ; and this not having been 

 effected, is probably the gravest and most obvious of 

 all the many objections which may be urged against 

 my views. Hence it will be worth while to sum up 

 the foregoing remarks, under an imaginary illustration. 

 The Malay Archipelago is of about the size of Europe 

 from the North Cape to the Mediterranean, and fron; 

 Britain to Russia ; and therefore equals all the geo- 

 logical formations which have been examined with 

 any accuracy, excepting those of the United States of 

 America. I fully agree with Mr. Godwin -Austen, 

 that the present condition of the Malay Archipelago, 



