Io! 
But watch the Monkey's eloquent eye as, with out- 
stretched arm, it silently craves the biscuit or nut, with 
which the schoolboy tantalises it; and consider what a 
boon articulate speech would have been; could it but 
have attained to the power. 
How comes it that the Dog, with tongue, lips, palate, 
teeth like Man, has, in all these ages, never been taught 
to uttera syllable: while the Parrof, with its hard beak, 
and round tongue, can chatter sentences by the hour; 
in a way that only those who have heard a first-class bird 
can credit. 
How is this, if God has simply granted to protoplasm 
to develope according to its mecessities: why are the 
organisms arrested where they are ? 
How greatly it would have tended to z¢s survival if 
the Great Auk had developed efficient wings ; instead or 
contenting itself with waddling up and off the rocks of its 
wild home. If, however, these same wings were among 
the things in process of being ‘aborted’ through disuse, 
it must be conceded as a great mistake. 
It is not that we would hesitate over the power of 
God to do this thing, to work by development, fad he 
so decreed: for we see, in an infinity of instances, that 
he is doing equal wonders daily. For example the 
gigantic Whale is rapidly developed from an egg of the 
same dimensions as that which developes into the common 
fern. 
Nor do we stumble at the idea that he has granted 
some capacity for variation: as we are continually 
reminded in the case of the varieties of forms developed 
by Man’s care, and notably from the Rock Pigeon (we do 
not hear so much about thetr certain tendency rapidly to 
revert to the original form if neglected.) 
But what many believe is that He has not acted so: 
