420 CONCLUDING REMARKS. Chap. XXYIII 



able to man ; for every one tries to get the best dogs, horses, 

 cows, or sheep, without thinking about their future progeny, 

 yet these animals would transmit more or less surely their 

 good qualities to their offspring. Nor is any one so careless 

 as to breed from his worst animals. Even savages, when 

 compelled from extreme want to kill some of their animals, 

 v ould destroy the worst and preserve the best. With ani- 

 mals kept for use and not for mere amusement, different 

 fashions prevail in different districts, leading to the preserva- 

 tion, and consequently to the transmission, of all sorts of 

 trifling peculiarities of character. The same process will 

 have been pursued with our fruit-trees and vegetables, for 

 the best will always have been the most largely cultivated, 

 and will occasionally have yielded seedlings better than their 

 parents. 



The different strains, just alluded to, which have been 

 actually produced by breeders without any wish on their 

 part to obtain such a result, afford excellent evidence of the 

 power of unconscious selection. This form of selection has 

 probably led to far more important results than methodical 

 selection, and is likewise more important under a theoretical 

 point of view from closely resembling natural selection. For 

 during this process the best or most valued individuals are 

 not separated and prevented from crossing with others of the 

 same breed, but are simply preferred and preserved ; yet this 

 inevitably leads to their gradual modification and improve- 

 ment ; so that finally they prevail, to the exclusion of the old 

 parent-form. 



Y\ ith our domesticated animals natural selection checks 

 the production of races with any injurious deviation of struc- 

 ture. In the case of animals which, from being kept by 

 savages or semi-civilised people, have to provide largely for 

 their own wants under different circumstances, natural selec- 

 tion will have played a more important part. Hence it 

 probably is that they often closely resemble natural species. 



As there is no limit to man's desire to possess animals and 

 plants more and more useful in any respect, and as the fancier 

 always wishes, owing to fashions running into extremes, to 

 pr duce each character more and more strongly pronounced, 



