246 NATURE'S STORY OF THE YEAR 



strongest or most " fit " survive. Thus Nature, by 

 an enormous waste of life, makes life strong and 

 enduring and virile. Man, of course, knows better 

 than Nature in these matters ; he must prevent, so 

 far as is possible, the elimination of his own 

 " unfit " ones ; nay, he must allow them to live and 

 perpetuate themselves and infect and strive with, 

 and perchance supplant, his healthiest, or finally 

 to yield to the slow attack of disease or the misery 

 of starvation. 



He who has seen the strong man bowed by a 

 lingering fatal disease, and heard his wish that the 

 slow torture might be speedily ended by artificial 

 means, must wonder for how long our customary 

 cruel mercies are to be inflicted on the hopeless 

 sick, when a few short years are all that the most 

 hopeful and strong can anticipate for himself. 



Our " fit " ones, again, those who are so greatly 

 endowed with this world's goods that their de- 

 scendants may live in comfort and spread over the 

 earth, are not necessarily of the - highest types, 

 though the victory is theirs. They may even lack 

 the wild beast's love for its offspring, and, con- 

 versely, there are always passing to oblivion a 



