NATURAL SELECTION CRITICISED. 289 



or lay down a pipe for the drawing off of water, is 

 it not equally reason in nature to drain moisture from 

 the ye by the express tube between it and the nostril 

 within. With every gradation, can you really explain the 

 successive steps in the laying down of that extraordinary 

 Vidian nerve ? " The Rocky Mountain or big-horned 

 sheep its horns are truly astounding ! their enormous 

 size is out of all proportion to the animal's body, and 

 they curve backwards and downwards, and then curl up 

 again in a sharp point" what gradation of natural 

 selection could make inch by inch horns like these or 

 those of a buffalo ten feet apart from tip to tip, or just 

 those of an ordinary ram which we have all seen many 

 scores of times ? Was it purpose, the postulated advant- 

 age, added the inch by inch ? 



Is it possible on terms of Mr. Darwin by gradation, 

 that is to account for any one element in nature, 

 whether as an element is to us, or as an element was 

 to the ancients ? Out of what did water come by 

 gradation ? Out of what earth ? Out of what fire, ? 

 Out of what air ? We have already asked the same 

 question of some of our own sixty-five elements; but 

 is not every one of them by itself, and without a 

 gradation from the others ? Is oxygen, then, but a 

 result of the survival of the fittest ? 



The final cause of the frontal sinuses has been a 

 puzzle for long. It is now suggested that they are to 

 be regarded as but resonant chambers for the voice. 

 Are they there, then, by a natural reason beyond our- 

 selves, even as the spleen is, or as the thyroid gland 

 (with that unintelligible Myxcedema} is, or as ever so 

 much else is ? Or shall we earn gratitude by suggest- 

 ing that they are the result of the labours of natural 

 selection through years upon years, and ages upon ages ? 



Do not the crows set a sentinel to watch ? If they, 



