436 Life and Immortality. 
the song-thrush. The small Asiatic cockroach has every- 
where in Russia driven before it its great congener, and the 
imported European hive-bee is rapidly exterminating in 
Australia the small, stingless bee, indigenous to the country. 
Hundreds of such cases might be cited, but we forbear. We 
can clearly see why the competition should be most severe 
between allied forms, which fill nearly the same place in the 
economy of nature; but it is perhaps not possible to indi- 
vidualize a case and say with preciseness why such species 
has been victorious over another in the battle of life. That 
the structure of every organic being is related, in the most 
essential yet often hidden manner to that of all the other 
organisms with which it comes into competition for food or 
residence, or from which it has to escape, or on which it 
preys, is a corollary of the highest importance deducible 
from the foregoing remarks. Very obvious is this in the 
structure of the teeth and talons of the tiger, and in that of 
the legs and claws of the parasite which clings to the hair on 
the tiger’s body. But in the beautifully-plumed seed of the 
dandelion and the flattened and fringed legs of the water- 
beetle the relation seems at first restricted to the elements of 
air and water, yet the advantage of plumed seeds undoubt- 
edly stands in the most intimate relation to the land, being 
already densely clothed with other plants, so that the seeds 
may be widely diffused and fall on unoccupied ground, while 
in the water-beetle, the structure of its legs, so admirably 
adapted for diving, allows it to compete with other aquatic 
insects, to hunt for its own prey and to escape destruction 
by other predaceous animals. All organic beings, it will thus 
be seen, are not only striving to increase in numbers, but are 
called upon some time in their lives to struggle for existence 
or to suffer serious if not utter destruction. When we reflect 
on this struggle, we can console ourselves with the full belief 
that this war of nature is not incessant, that no fear is felt, 
that death is generally sudden, and that the vigorous, healthy 
and happy survive and multiply. 
