1885.] 
The Parasites of Civilisation. 395 
sure as an animated being pleases us with its beauty, solaces 
us with its song, and leaves our persons and property un- 
lnjuied, so surely we find it comparatively rare, decreasing 
in numbers, and hovering on the very verge of extinction. 
, sure as a wild plant is pleasing to us by its form, its 
colours, and its fragrance, its preservation seems to task all 
our efforts. A beautiful or a harmless animal or plant never, 
we believe, becomes naturalised in any country by accident. 
With the ugly and the noxious animal and plant the con- 
verse holds good. The utmost we can effect against such 
ot these as come under the category of the parasites of 
civilisation is to keep them at bay, to prevent their increase. 
How we have to watch against the immigration of new 
\eimm and weeds, and how often do they elude our 
vigilance ! 
Why this disconnection between beauty and utility, on 
the one hand, and vitality and fecundity on the other, should 
exist is an unsolved problem. Many attempts at an ex- 
planation have been made, but none of them have proved 
acceptable save within very narrow limits. 
Some say that we consider beautiful chiefly what is rare, 
and loathe, or at least ignore, whatsoever is common. This 
suggestion by no means holds good. There are many dis- 
tricts where, e.g., the mountain- and the cross-leaved 
heaths ( Erica cinerea and E. tetralix), harebell, the wild 
yvood-hyacinth, the forget-me-not, are as abundant as are 
in others the veriest weeds. Yet no man fails on that 
account to recognise their beauty. On the contrary, they 
seem far more attractive in masses than when scattered 
singly. So the question of rarity or abundance is not to 
the purpose. 
Another explanation advanced is that certain animals and 
plants are extirpated on account of their very beauty, whilst 
the ugly are passed by. In this there is unfortunately a 
certain amount of truth. The shady coombes of Devon 
are being plundered of their delicate ferns, and the wood- 
lands of Kent and Suffolk stripped of their lilies of the 
valley, by dealers and their emissaries. We know not a few 
localities where choice wild plants have flourished within a 
few years, of which now not a trace remains. We fully 
admit that any rare and beautiful bird showing itself in this 
country is at once shot down, to be exhibited as a “ British 
specimen ” of so and so. We know, and had we the power 
we would visit with crushing penalties, the destruction of 
humming-birds, trogons, birds of paradise, &c., at the 
dictates of fashion and ostentation. But all this does not 
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