Chap. XVII. SEXUAL SELECTION : MAMMALS. 
2S9 
CHAPTEE XVII. 
Second AEY Sexual Chaeacters of Mammals. 
The law of battle — Special weapons, confined to the males — Cause 
of absence of weapons in the female — Weapons common to both 
sexes, yet primarily acquired by the male — Other uses of such 
weapons — Their high importance — Greater size of the male — 
Means of defence — On the preference shewn by either sex in the 
pairing of quadrupeds. 
With mammals the male appears to win the female 
much more through the law of battle than through the 
display of his charms. The most timid animals, not 
provided with any special weapons for fighting, engage 
in desperate conflicts during the season of love. Two 
male hares have been seen to fight together until onu 
was killed ; male moles often fight, and sometimes with 
fatal results ; male squirrels engage in frequent con- 
tests, and often wound each other severely ; ” as do 
male beavers, so that hardly a skin is without scars.”^ 
I observed the same fact with the hides of the guana- 
coes in Patagonia ; and on one occasion several were so 
absorbed in fighting that they fearlessly rushed close by 
me. Livingstone speaks of the males of the many ani- 
mals in Southern Africa as almost invariably shewing 
the scars received in former contests. 
The law of battle prevails with aquatic as with ter- 
^ See Waterton’s account of two hares lighting, ‘ Zoologist/ vol. i. 
184:3, p. 211. On moles, Bell, ‘Hist, of British Quadrupeds,’ 1st edit, 
p. 100. On squirrels, Audubon and Bachman, ‘ Viviparous Quadrupeds 
of N. America/ 184:6, p. 269. On beavers, Mr. A. H. Green, in ‘ Journal 
of Lin. Soc. Zoolog,’ vol. x. 1869, p. 362. 
