in.] DR. BATEMAN ON DARWINISM. 41 



to be called "immaterial" or not is quite beside the 

 question. 



Our author's argumentation, it will be rightly 

 inferred, is more or less rambling in character. Re- 

 turning to the two propositions which really make 

 up his argument, it is an obvious criticism that every 

 sensible Darwinian will concede them both without a 

 moment's hesitation. There is not the slightest evi- 

 dence of the existence of a race of men destitute 

 of articulate speech ; and if apes or any other 

 animals do possess the slightest trace of such an 

 acquisition, it may safely be neglected on the prin- 

 ciple of de minimis non curat lex}- It is only Dr. 

 Bateman's imaginary Danvinian who finds it difficult 

 to admit these plain facts. The actual supporters 

 of this " dangerous heresy " have never gone out of 

 their way to detect an historical substratum for 

 Reynard or ^Esop, or to hunt from its obscurity the 

 Leibnitzian story of the Latin-speaking dog; there 

 are some of them, we fear, who would even, on 

 general grounds, cast discredit on the story of 

 Balaam. But if this be really the Darwinian state 

 of mind, then Dr. Bateman's work is plainly a case 



1 Neglected, or conceded, by the controversialist, I mean : to the 

 disinterested student of nature no fact, however small, is really 

 trivial. 



