200 
Beautiful destroyers, in fact, abound everywhere. It is 
most interesting to watch the interweaving of these forms of 
danger with the harmless seaweed in the pools of ocean, and 
to pursue the theme by the aid of the microscope. If it were 
not for prodigious fecundity, we might marvel at the escape of 
any of these tiny and unprotected existences. 
The vegetable creation is no exception to the rule of the 
existence of destroyers. In fact, the serpentine race have 
their exact parallel in those climbing plants which are designed 
to strangle and to overpower the nobler denizens of the 
forest. Even the strength of the oak is often poorly matched 
against the insidious advance and deadly embrace of the ivy. 
Wherever man makes his way, he is prone to overturn the 
balance and harmony of nature. He has introduced the 
thistle, and the beautiful native vegetation of the South 
American plains is supplanted by this noxious weed. He has 
introduced the rat into New Zealand, and the curious native 
birds can no longer rear their young unmolested.* He strips 
the mountains bare of their forests, and arid plains take the 
place of fruitful and pleasant prairies; or he cuts down the 
woods, in order to deprive a conquered population of shelter, 
and converts a land, such as Ireland once was, into irreclaim- 
able morass. The utter destruction of the enemy’s country 
was often systematically pursued. Thus Assurbanipal says : — 
“ For a month and a day Elam to its utmost extent I swept, 
The passage of men, the treading of oxen and sheep 
And the springing up of good trees I burned off the fields, 
Wild asses, serpents, beasts of the desert, “ Ugallu,” 
Safely I caused to lay down in them.”f 
In very many regions of the old world, these desolations have 
left their effect till the present time.J 
Now in the view of the universal prevalence of destroyers, 
what becomes of the doctrine of “the survival of the fittest ”? 
Is the cat more fit to survive than the garden warbler which 
it massacres ? or is the man-eating tiger of India a more worthy 
survival than the native whom he carries off into the jungle ? 
Darwinism has never attempted to cope with the difficulty 
of explaining how the poison of the viper could be developed 
out of a harmless snake. 
creation, qui ccpendant ne ddpasse en ricn un brin d’herbe, qui pousse, ni 
tine branclie d’arbre qui ddveloppc son fruit, au centre duquel est la semence 
qui doit se reproduire a l’infini.” — Monde des A tomes, p. 3. 
* Buffer’s History of the Birds of New Zealand, pp. 32, 93. 
t Assyrian Discoveries, by G. Smith, p. 355. f Appendix B. 
