A QUESTION OF CHOICE 



THERE is a very laconic entry in Gilbert White's 

 Nature calendar to the effect that in November 



bucks grunt." Any one who has the privilege 

 of exploring a deer forest at this season will admit 

 that bucks do grunt, and a good deal more, for 

 they roar and bellow in a fashion which may be 

 a little disturbing to weak nerves. The truth is, 

 the great heart of the stag is just now rilled with 

 love, which, as is common with male animals all 

 the world over, manifests itself first in a prodigious 

 passion of hatred directed against all of his 

 own sex. 



It is not the love of the stag, however, so 

 much as the love of the hind that I am moved to 

 write about just now. I have just been reading 

 a book by a lady who traces most of the evils of 

 our evil world back to the fact, real or assumed, 

 that the human female has been deprived of her 

 right to choose her mate a right enjoyed by the 

 female of all the higher animal races. She took 

 deer as a type, and her view of the case is that 

 the males fight furiously, and that the females 

 who have been spectators of the combat and judges 

 of it choose the better fighter as consort and king. 

 Thus the high quality of the breed is maintained, 



