176 Darwin and Romanes dealt with. 



guessers — they are full of " probablys," " might he's," 

 "may he's," "must he's," and so on, and don't draw 

 distinctions they easily might do, were they not pre- 

 occupied and prejudiced, in the old fashioned and 

 less unworthy sense of it. 



Darwin himself is not guiltless of the same ill ten- 

 dency as his imitators have cultivated to so dangerous 

 an extent, as when he writes, at p. 210, Origin of 

 Species (6th edition) : " The act of pointing probably 

 is as many have thought, only the exaggerated pause 

 of an animal preparing to spring on its prey.'' The 

 "probably is," and the "many have thought,"' are 

 really very characteristic here. The " probably is," 

 so naively backed up with the loose " thinking " or 

 supposing of the " many," that really from our great 

 observer and man of science and evolutionist, it is, 

 as Artemus the witty says, a darn site too much in 

 the way of supposition — supposition by supposition, 

 and put down as if it might blossom into scientific 

 fact itself. 



XXIV. 



Is then the doctrine of "survival of the fittest" to 

 be regarded as illustrated in cuckoos that reduced 

 the size of their eggs by one means or another? I, 

 for one, can hardly think it. First of all, it is clear — 

 clear as noonday — that the process was gradual ; very 

 gradual. The cuckoos in these early days, while 

 still laying larger eggs, survived ; else we should not 

 have such large families of them now. They sur- 

 vived, and since a beginning must have been made 

 in laying eggs in other birds' nests, and they sue- 



