27 '* s^'*5 '^'"^ ^'"6 



plants and animals who do stick it out and those of us 

 human beings who seem to do the same. 



As usual, the animals are healthy and happy because 

 they have adapted themselves to the environment. As 

 usual, man is healthy and happy because even when, like 

 me, he prides himself on being not too timid about those 

 aspects of nature which are not familiar, he has modified 

 the environment to make it conform to his own fixed needs. 

 Man can change things as no other animal can. But by 

 way of compensation he can change himself much less. 



Of that difference and what it implies we shall perhaps 

 have something to say later on, but it is obvious that his 

 method implies penalties as well as advantages and in the 

 long run the penalties may count for more than he now 

 suspects. For the moment, however, I am most interested 

 in those creatures who have taken things as they found 

 them and then found out how to find them good. It is sur- 

 prising how many different ways there are of doing just 

 that. 



On the desk beside me as I write is a largish glass jar, 

 its bottom covered with two inches of damp, sandy soil. 

 In one corner, buried to the eyes and nose, is a small toad 

 who has grown from half an inch to two inches long under 

 my eyes. Occasionally he sits fully exposed on a miniature 

 hillock and surveys his world. Most of the time, however, 

 he prefers to remain covered or almost covered by the 

 nice, soft mud. 



While he was very small and I waved in front of him 

 a microscopic piece of raw beef on the end of a broom- 

 straw, he would seize it with absurd ferocity and, if it was 

 rather large for the size of his gullet, he would use a front 



