50 " Natural Selection " 



were the cause, the tribe would soon disappear ; but the 

 balance of nature never varies, and nothing is left to 

 chance. But now that we know the law, there is no 

 difficulty in understanding the unvarying proportion 

 of all species. Darwin adopted Malthus's doctrine to 

 prove the survival of the fittest, but as it is now 

 established that mankind or nations never do outrun 

 the means of subsistence and that the birth-rate 

 depends primarily upon the demands of the labour 

 market, so we know that animals maintain a direct 

 ratio to their means of subsistence, the antelope to 

 the amount of vegetation, the lions to the number of 

 antelopes. So much is this the case that the ratio is 

 constant and unvarying. As already pointed out, the 

 undue increase of the lions would shatter the " scheme 

 of things entire," but this is impossible under the 

 operation of the law regulating the cannibal habit in 

 the male. 



It is very striking to observe how Wallace never 

 hesitates to contradict Darwin as to the workings of 

 " natural selection," and " sexual selection." For 

 example, in regard to the gaudy plumage of male birds, 

 he explains that the females are plain and non- 

 attractive in order that while sitting on eggs they may 

 not attract attention. Surely this is far-fetched and 

 shows the straits to which Darwinians have been 

 driven in order to maintain their hypothesis. As 

 Dewar points out, in some species, e.g. the Paradise 

 Fly-catcher, where the male bird is brilliantly coloured, 

 we find him sitting on the eggs quite as much as the 

 hen. Again, in the Indian Sunbirds the cocks are 

 brilliantly coloured and the hens not so, but as the 

 nests are well covered in, the latter might have 

 possessed all the colours of the rainbow. 



On pages 340 and 341 they give instances of marked 

 variations which occur in the genus homo : (a) Colour 



