Chap. IL SPECIES. 165 



better. But, like many relics of past time, it is dragged in as a sort of theo- 

 retical bugbear, and exhibited only now and then to make a false show in discus- 

 sions upon the question of the unity of origin of mankind. 



There is another fallacy connected Avith the prevailing ideas about species to 

 wliich I would also allude : the fancy that species do not exist in the same way 

 in nature as genera, families, orders, classes, and t3'pes. It is actually maintained 

 by some that species are founded in nature in a manner different from these groups; 

 that their existence is, as it were, more real, whilst that of the other groups is 

 considered as ideal, e\'en when it is admitted that these groups have themselves a 

 natural foundation. 



Let us consider this point more closely, as it involves the whole question of 

 individuality. I wish, however, not to be understood as undervaluing the impor- 

 tance of sexual relations as indicative of the close ties which unite, or may unite, 

 the individuals of the same species. I know as well as any one to what extent 

 they manifest themselves in nature, but I mean to insist upon the undeniable fact 

 that these relations are not so exclusive as those naturalists would represent them, 

 who urge them as an unfailing criterion of specific identity. I would remind those 

 who constantly forget it, that there are animals which, though specifically distinct 

 do unite sexually, which do produce oflfspring, mostly sterile, it is true, in some 

 .species, but fertile to a limited extent in others, and in others even fertile to an 

 extent which it has not yet been possible to determine. Sexual connection is the 

 result, or rather one of the most striking expressions of the close relationship 

 established in the beginning between individuals of the same species, and by no 

 means the cause of their identity in successive generations. When first created, 

 animals of the same species paired because they were made one for the other ; 

 they did not take one another in order to build up their species, which had full 

 existence before the first individual produced by sexual connection was boni. 



This view of the subject acquires greater importance in proportion as it becomes 

 more apparent that species did not originate in single pairs, but were created in 

 large numljers, in those numeric proportions which constitute the natural harmonies 

 between organized beings. It alone explains the possibility of the procreation 

 of Hybrids, as founded upon the natural relationship of individuals of closely 

 allied species, Avhich may become fertile Avith one another, the more readily as they 

 difler less, .structurallv. 



To assume that sexual relations determine the species it should further be shown 

 that aljsolute promiscuousness of sexes among individuals of the same species is the 

 prevailing characteristic of the animal kingdom, while the fact i.s, that a large num- 

 ber even of animals, not to speak of Man, select their mate for life and rarely 

 have any intercourse with others. It is a fact known to every farmer, that difler- 



