FOOT-NOTES TO EVOLUTION. 



I. 



THE KINSHIP OF LIFE. 



No one with good eyes and brains behind them has 



ever looked forth on the varied Ufe of the world, on 



forest or meadow or brook or sea, with- 



What is the p^^. ^j. jg^gj. q^(.q asking himself the ques- 



cause of variety ,, ^^^^ -^ ^^^ ^^^^^ ^f Nature's end- 



less variety ? We see many kmds or 



birds and trees and insects and fishes and flowers and 



blades of grass, and yet when we look closely we find not 



one blade of grass in the meadow quite like another blade. 



The green cloak which covers the brown earth is the 



shield under which millions of organisms, brown or 



green, carry on their life work ; yet not one organism 



in the world in body or mind is the exact measure of 



its neighbour. But with all this the real variety in life 



is far greater than that which appears. 



(^^ Each kind of animal or plant, that is, each set of 



forms which in the vicissitudes of the ages has become 



segregated and set off from its neigh- 



What IS a bours, is called in biology a species, 



species? ^, , r , ■ • 



The number of these species is great 



beyond any ordinary conception. I have an old book 



in my library, the tenth edition of the Systema Naturae, 



