134 A NATURALIST IN THE GUIANAS 



ship existing between the bees and the Catasetum, a 

 relationship on which the latter depends for the con- 

 tinuity of its species : these are but a few instances of 

 the wondrous contrivances of Nature, the results of the 

 gradual development and perfection of particular organs 

 or senses useful to their possessors or necessary for the 

 preservation of their kind. And yet, in spite of these 

 evidences of the adaptability of life to almost any con- 

 dition we may think of ; in spite of the positive proofs 

 we possess of the changes effected during the course of 

 ages in the structure and habits of the beings inhabiting 

 our globe, and of those who peopled it in the past and are 

 no more, the majority of mankind persists in upholding 

 that each form of life as we see it now was so created 

 from the very beginning, with man, of course, at the head 

 of the list. Why should we discard a theory so flattering 

 to our overweening vanity ? 



But to return to our friends at La Prision, who 

 certainly do not worry themselves very much as to how 

 they appeared on earth, or whither is bound whatever im- 

 mortality they may possess, their thoughts being too much 

 occupied with the material question of obtaining food for 

 the day. They add something to their bare diet of rice 

 and peas and coarse ground provisions by hunting, but 

 game is not over abundant in the immediate vicinity of 

 the settlement. Now and again a tapir is killed. At 

 rare intervals bands of peccaries visit the clearing, doing 

 considerable damage before they are dispersed, with the 

 loss of a few of their number whose flesh, salted and dried, 

 is consumed by the owners of the ravaged gardens, not as 

 might be supposed in the spirit of retaliation inculcated by 

 the principle of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, 

 Imt because the flesh of the peccary is really excellent 



