NATURAL SELECTION 189 



of life, and which has apparently been saved from fatal 

 competition by having inhabited a protected station. As 

 buds give rise by growth to fresh buds, and these, if 

 vigorous, branch out and overtop on all sides many a 

 feebler branch, so by generation I believe it has been 

 with the great Tree of Life, which fills with its dead and 

 broken branches the crust of the earth, and covers the 

 surface with its ever-branching and beautiful ramifications. 



