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Observing the animal in its new environment we 

 are apt to believe that it has been especially adapted 

 to this environment. We might mention many or- 

 gans, however, which have been preserved although 

 they are not only useless but positively injurious. In 

 his Etudes sur la nature humaine, Metchnikoff gives 

 many examples of this anomaly : the hair on the human 

 body whose follicular harbor microbes, the vermiform 

 appendix, the seat "of appendicitis, the large intestine 

 easily affected by various infections, etc. There are 

 even more striking "discrepancies," such as the lack 

 of proportion between the pain felt in certain cases 

 by the organism and the cause of that pain. "Insig- 

 nificant causes," Metchnikoff writes, "unimportant 

 sicknesses, like neuralgia, will sometimes inflict un- 

 bearable suffering. Parturition, a natural physiolog- 

 ical phenomenon, is, in the majority of cases, accom- 

 panied by very acute pains which are absolutely 

 useless as a 'danger signal.' " 



"On the other hand, some of the most dangerous 

 diseases, such as cancer and nephritis, can develop for 

 a long period of time without causing the slightest 

 sensation of pain, with the result that the patient's 

 attention is not attracted to them until it is too late 

 to apply a remedy." 1 



We also observe cases of faulty adaptation of in- 

 stincts : insects are drawn to the flame of a lamp and 



i E. Metchxikoff. Tltudes sur la nature humaine, 248-249. 



