A REJOINDER 169 



incapable of feeling pain to the extent that more 

 normal people do. Why then does Miss Wodehouse 

 think that mortal combats are not desirable ? 

 They result in the elimination of the weak 

 and the sm:vival of the strong, who fear not 

 strife and relatively feel not pain. Surely that is 

 a desirable state of affairs. It is better to 

 have a strong stock than a weak one ; one that 

 cannot feel pain, or, feeling it, can endure it with 

 Spartan silence, rather than one which shrinks away 

 at the sight of any implement capable of inflicting 

 pain. If Nature has evolved that race, surely it is 

 superior to that which the " We " is endeavouring 

 to bring to a fearsome and miserable existence. 



Very much the same considerations hold for that 

 other supposed horrible state of things, which I 

 am accused of commending as desirable, where a 

 certain race of " ants carefully nurse the larvae of 

 beetles, which will presently eat the baby ants." 

 But is there any evidence at all that this is a painful 

 process ? Even if we suppose it to be so, is it more 

 painful than would be the death of the beetle larvae, 

 which would perish from starvation if they had not 

 the baby ants to eat ? If Miss Wodehouse shudders 

 at the fate of the one, does she also shudder at the 

 fate awaiting the other ? These things are unavoid- 

 able ; they are an integral part of the operations of 

 Nature ; and the Kea Parrot which swoops down 

 upon the back of sheep and is said to extract their 

 kidneys, and the butcher-bird which impales beetles 

 and frogs upon thorns to a tree trunk, are doing no 



