1844—1858] HIGHNESS AND LOWNESS IIS 



then would be degradation in the class, but certainly increase Letter 70 

 in the scale of organisation in the general inhabitants of the 

 country. On the other hand, it would be quite as easy to 

 believe that true earthworms might beat out the Typhlops. I 

 do not see how this " competitive highness " can be tested in 

 any way by us. And this is a comfort to me when mentally 

 comparing the Silurian and Recent organisms. Not that I 

 doubt a long course of " competitive highness " will ultimately 

 make the organisation higher in every sense of the word ; 

 but it seems most difficult to test it. Look at the Erigcron 

 canadensis on the one hand and Anacharis l on the other ; 

 these plants must have some advantage over European pro- 

 ductions, to spread as they have. Yet who could discover it ? 

 Monkeys can co-exist with sloths and opossums, orders at 

 the bottom of the scale ; and the opossums might well be 

 beaten by placental insectivores, coming from a country where 

 there were no monkeys, etc. I should be sorry to give up the 

 view that an old and very large continuous territory would 

 generally produce organisms higher in the competitive sense 

 than a smaller territory. I may, of course, be quite wrong 

 about the plants of Australia (and your facts are, of course, 

 quite new to me on their highness), but when I read the 

 accounts of the immense spreading of European plants in 

 Australia, and think of the wool and corn brought thence to 

 Europe, and not one plant naturalised, I can hardly avoid the 

 suspicion that Europe beats Australia in its productions. If 

 many {i.e. more than one or two) Australian plants are truly 

 naturalised in India (N.B. Naturalisation on Indian mountains 

 hardly quite fair, as mountains are small islands in the land) 

 I must strike my colours. I should be glad to hear whether 

 what I have written very obscurely on this point produces 

 any effect on you ; for I want to clear my mind, as perhaps 

 I should put a sentence or two in my abstract 2 on this 

 subject. 



I have always been willing to strike my colours on former 

 immense tracts of land in oceans, if any case required it in 

 an eminent degree. Perhaps yours may be a case, but at 



1 Anacharis {Elodca canadensis) and Erigcron canadensis are both 

 successful immigrants from America. 



- Abstract was Darwin's name for the Origin during parts of 1858 

 and 1859. 



