MAN AND NATURE. 299 



or other causes affecting the supply of food. But the 

 history of our domestic breeds, and of agriculture as 

 connected with them, shows how far human influence 

 extends in making one part of nature subservient to 

 another, and all minister to Man's wants or pleasures. 

 The effects of selection, guided by reason and expe- 

 rience, in the breeding of animals, are even more 

 striking than as applied to the vegetable kingdom. 

 We here obtain qualities and aptitudes for use, not 

 only far exceeding, but often very different from, those 

 which belong to the primitive stock. The natural in- 

 stincts of animals are moulded into new modes of 

 action ; and in the case of those most largely endowed 

 Avith intelligence and moral affections (and, however 

 we may define these faculties, who can doubt their 

 presence in the dog, the elephant, the horse, and many 

 other animals ?) human intelligence is still more 

 curiously occupied in bringing them into action and 

 adaptation. We may remark, in passing, on the 

 singular anomaly that the animal nearest akin to the 

 human being in structure and faculties should be 

 amongst those most alien to him in every matter of 

 mutual relation and dependence. Whatever explana- 

 tion we may give of it, we have the fact before us that 

 the anthropoid apes, and the quadrumana generally, 

 are more detached from Man in the conditions of life 

 than many far more remote from him in the scale of 

 being. Eemove them from our menageries and street- 

 organs, and these creatures, the strange mimics of 

 humanity, would scarcely be known to the civilised 

 world save by the narrative of the tropical traveller, 



