The Wit of the Wild 



r 



the duty of keeping within bounds the degree 

 of multiplication. 



Self-sacrifice is a supernatural, human idea, 

 utterly at variance with all nature not human, 

 and subversive of its prime reason and motive 

 for existing. Nothing could be more illogical, 

 or wicked, in the brute world, than the possi- 

 bility of intentional self-destruction. Dogs and 

 other animals may sometimes recklessly expose 

 their lives to fatal peril, or, influenced by some 

 nervous stress or extreme emotion, fall ill and 

 die, or do blindly some fatal act; but we may 

 be sure that no animal ever truly commits sui- 

 cide, because no animal has any conception that 

 it is possible to do so. 



210 



