DARWINISM: ITS WEAK AND STRONG POINTS. 67 



tion the departure from original type at length reaches 

 a point where reproduction ceases, or is carried on 

 with great difficulty. A diminutive variety of the 

 black and tan terrier has been bred down to a degree 

 that admits of restricted fruitfulness. 



It is a strange fact in regard to ancestral pecu- 

 liarities of a fractional nature, that the offspring of 

 the jack and the mare takes after the sire in voice, 

 and therefore brays; while the progeny of the stallion 

 and the jenny follows the dam, and also brays. This 

 circumstance tends to show that hybrids do not par- 

 take equally from either parent. It has been estimated 

 that the equine hybrid is two-fifths horse and three- 

 fifths asinine stock. These are not uncommon frac- 

 tions among results of cross-breeding. 



Darwinism is supported by the appreciable ten- 

 dency in the organic world to deviate. It is a fact 

 that no two blades of grass are alike; even "as near 

 alike as two peas" is only a figurative comparison, for 

 no two seeds in a pod are identical in every feature. 

 Perfect resemblance between parent and child is never 

 seen. Even twins among children fail to present the 

 close resemblance generally accredited to them. Tend- 

 ency to variation must be regarded as an attribute 

 of organic bodies. Although the acknowledged vari- 

 ability is elastic enough to permit the evolution of 

 varieties, it is a question whether it will admit the 

 differences which constitute species. 



Fossil bones from the Tertiary period of the earth's 

 geological history show that "giants lived in those 

 days;" not human beings of gigantic proportions, but 

 ponderous saurians and marine monsters. These, ac- 

 cording to Darwin, were naturally evolved from smaller 

 varieties, served the purposes of their bulky organiza- 



