DARWINISM DEFENDED. 17? 



ological or biological phenomena, whether these exist in a 

 single individual or in two? How does it come that when 

 the antlers of the giant stag become larger and larger, the 

 skull bones become thicker and the neck tendons and the 

 fore legs stronger (Spencer) ? With the gradual lengthen- 

 ing of the giraffe's neck the skeletal system and with it 

 numerous other closely-related internal organs have to be- 

 come larger simultaneously. Hundreds of small modifica- 

 tions are necessary. How does it happen that all come off 

 exactly as is necessary? When the flowers' cups for any 

 reason become deeper the insects must develop longer 

 proboscides in order to reach the nectaries in the bottom of 

 the cup. Simultaneously the sucking apparatus of the 

 oesophagus must change. How does it happen that these 

 modifications in two different organisms, in an animal and a 

 plant, occur part passuf 



"In order to satisfy these questions of doubt Darwin and 

 Wallace have referred to the domesticated animals as the 

 best proofs that such coadaptations are possible. A grey- 

 hound, a bulldog, a dachshund, a tumbler pigeon, a race- 

 horse, have had to pass through a long series of numerous 

 changes in the most various organs, in order to reach their 

 present form, and yet all these variations have appeared 

 one after the other in such a way as never to endanger the 

 vital vigour, for man would never have chosen weakly ani- 

 mals for breeding purposes. In artificial selection, there- 

 fore, coadaptations are possible in almost infinite variety, 

 and it can fairly be asked if such favourable conditions are 

 not also possible in nature. This query must, a priori, be 

 answered in the affirmative, for man is not able either to 

 make more easy or to hasten the appearance of coadapta- 

 tions : he can only hold on to those which once appear, and 

 this can also be done by the struggle for existence in those 

 cases in which the coadaptive variations are of vital import- 

 ance. The real difference lies, therefore, in the fact that 



