170 MAMMALIAN DESCENT. [Lect. VII. 



piece, as it also sheathes the base of the nasal partition walL 

 I find this state of things in a sub-adult specimen of the 

 lesser kind (Hemicentetes), and the smallest kind (Micro- 

 gale) ; my specimen of the latter, M. longicaudata, has a 

 tail nearly twice as long as its body, which is very 

 curious for a member of the Tenrec family, the main 

 type of which has merely a stump, and is termed 

 ecaudatus on that account. This fact is worth remark- 

 ing, for nature runs on her segments in the hind part of 

 the axis of a Mammal in a seemingly hap-hazard manner; 

 ready at any moment to " dock " them, as horse-dealers 

 their " cattle," or as dog-fanciers curtail their pups. 



I may remark, in passing, that I use the term "Nature" 

 as a personification of the forces that are at work in 

 organisms, feigning her to have a quasi-human character^ 

 — ^partly kind, partly cruel, — because to us Western 

 people, here, in the end of the nineteenth century, the old 

 Eastern custom of ascribing both evil and good directly 

 to the Deity seems irreverent and profane. Let that 

 pass ; — the biologist stops his ears for the time to the 

 groans of this nether world, and goes on, with what 

 cheerfulness he can muster, at his own proper work. 

 He will be ready to argue about the origin of evil, and 

 the meaning of pain, when he has the proper data, which 

 will not be until the " consummation of all things." 



Nature has been a good mother to the Tenrec ; she 

 has set him up in life with a good stock of all that 

 he can Avant ; and when he is weary she gives him 



