THE BAY OF BISCAY. 237 



According to the system of evolution, germs are 

 as ancient as the world itself. In other words, God 

 in forming the universe created simultaneously all 

 the organised beings which were to people it to the 

 end of time. Each of these germs is, in short, either 

 a complete plant with its roots, trunks, branches, 

 and leaves, or a perfect animal, which is deficient in 

 no respect, not even in a hair or a feather. When 

 placed under favourable conditions, this kind of 

 animated miniature grows, it is true, but it never adds 

 the slightest new part to those which it has possessed 

 from the creation of the world. 



Up to this point the evolutionists are tolerably 

 unanimous, but all accordance disappears among them 

 when they are called upon to explain the actual 

 distribution of these germs. Some, as Bonnet, hold 

 that these infinitely small germs, which are by nature 

 indestructible, are everywhere diffused. They main- 

 tain that they circulate in the sap of trees and in the 

 blood of animals, being always ready to become 

 either wholly or partially developed, either for the 

 sake of giving birth to an embryo, or of reproducing 

 some organ that has been lost by the living being 

 which encloses them. The young bird and the young 

 mammal are germs which have undergone a com- 

 plete evolution : the claw of the crab which has been 

 reproduced after having been torn off; the head or 

 the tail of the worm which is reproduced after having 

 been severed from the rest of the body, are the claw, 

 head, and tail of so many germs, which profit by the 

 opportunity of developing a portion of their being, 

 whilst the rest remain in a rudimentary state. 



