281 
them called Pelones , and the other Calougas ; the former possess- 
ing a very scanty fine fur, and the latter without any hair at all, 
and each peculiar to the district it inhabits, and either not trans- 
ferable, or with difficulty transferable, into any colder region. He 
thinks that these would be admitted as species by naturalists. Far 
from it. It is merely a simple case of modification to suit altered 
condition of life. It is exactly the same case in oxen as we see in 
the Merino and Australian sheep ; but such a variation is not 
what we desiderate. Show us an animal between the ox and the 
sheep, or rather a series of animals exhibiting the transitions be- 
tween them. But Mr Darwin, in reply, tells us, that we cannot 
expect to trace these new species in their actual transit. While 
commencing their variation, we call them varieties ; when they are 
farther removed, we dispute which they are ; when they are com- 
plete, we call them species. He with some justice (but not entire 
justice) remarks, that we are here, as compared with the great spaces 
of time which he requires for the development of his new species, 
merely at a single point of view, and at no one point can you expect 
to see a passage taking place, because the assumption is that every 
passage is gradual. We see the present species ; but we do not know 
that we either see its parent or its descendant. I admit that, 
under such premises, we cannot see the passage ; but surely over the 
whole surface of the earth, and out of all the living creatures 
swarming upon it, we ought to detect some species whose parents 
have not yet perished, and whose descendants have already appeared. 
Mr Darwin would like to escape from this position— but he cannot. 
He says “ It should always be borne in mind what sort of interme- 
diate forms must on my theory have formerly existed. I have 
found it difficult, when looking at any two species, to avoid picturing 
to myself forms directly intermediate between them. But this is a 
wholly false view ; we should always look for forms — intermediate 
between each species, and a common but unknown progenitor” (p. 
280). Now this is merely confusing the thing ; the process being 
gradual, there must be some exactly and directly true half-way in- 
termediate form between the parent species and the descendant spe- 
cies, and it matters not to us that we know only one of these, nor 
does it matter that we know neither. What concerns us is, that 
there ought to be half-way steps between every form and something 
else which is either now living, or which has lived, on the face of the 
