394 SEA-SIDE STUDIES. 



possessing the special function of walking or flying ; it may 

 have the general function of Sensibility, without the special 

 Senses ; the general function of Assimilation, without 

 special Digestion ; for the special functions special organs 

 are required, legs or wings, eyes or ears, intestinal canal, 

 and so forth. 



The peculiar faculty of locomotion known as "flying," 

 can only be performed by the peculiar organs knouii as 

 "wings;" but the general faculty of locomotion can be 

 performed by a simple contractile tissue. As soon as we 

 disengage language of its ambiguity, the truth is easily 

 seen : the appearance of each special organ in the animal 

 series is coincident with the appearance of a special and 

 corresponding function ; or, descending the scale, with the 

 disappearance of each special organ, the corresponding spe- 

 cialty of function disappears. In other words, Function is 

 dependent on Organ, as the Act is on the Agent. Would 

 it not seem wholly preposterous to say that railway loco- 

 motion was not necessarily dependent on railways, because, 

 before railways were invented, goods and passengers were 

 transmitted by waggons and coaches ? Does not every one 

 see that the special form of railway transmission gives it a 

 power, velocity, and extent, wholly unattainable by waggons 

 and coaches ; and that this power, velocity, and extent, are 

 due entirely to the peculiarity of the methods of transit ? 

 The railway differs from the tramway, and the tramway 

 from the old coach-road, in special modifications, as the 

 lungs of a mammal differ from the giUs of a fish, and the 

 gills from a merely respiiatory surface in the Zoophyte. To 



