58 



" Natural Selection 



such thing ; that numbers are kept constant by the 

 elimination of all individuals born in excess of those 

 required to maintain the species at the existing figure, 

 and that the elimination of the surplus is effected not by 

 natural selection, but by chance, by the drawing of 

 lots." Is it not remarkable that these able observers 

 should talk of chance in regard to the operations of 

 nature? we constantly say that "miracles do not 

 happen," because the Deity never violates the laws 

 which he has established, such as gravitation, con- 

 servation of energy, " omne vivum ex vivo," etc., and 

 yet these most competent zoologists actually suggest 

 chance to explain the phenomenon which Darwin ad- 

 mitted, of the method of which he was ignorant, and said 

 was " most obscure." It is surely evident at last with- 

 out fear of contradiction, after all the evidence culled 

 from the best authorities on the subject, from men of 

 practical knowledge of all animals in captivity and in 

 the wild state, that the cannibal habit in the male is 

 the means of the " elimination of all individuals born 

 in excess of the numbers required to maintain the 

 species at the existing figure." Dewar and Finn go on 

 to say : " Under such circumstances there may be evo- 

 lution ; existing species may undergo change, but the 

 evolution will be determined solely by the lines along 

 which variations occur. If mutations take place only 

 along certain fixed lines and tend to accumulate in the 

 given direction, evolution will proceed along these 

 lines quite independently of the utility to the organism 

 of the mutations that occur. An unfavourable muta- 

 tion will have precisely the same effect as a favourable 

 one. If, on the other hand, mutations occur indis- 

 criminately on all sides of the mean, then these muta- 

 tions which happen to occur most frequently will have 

 the best chance of survival, and they will mark the 

 lines of the evolution. Under such circumstances there 



