Darwin’s essay on instinct. 
19 
of ages might modify and perfect almost to any degree the nest of a 
bird in comparison with that of its progenitors.” Mr. Darwin shows 
likewise that variations of instinct have occurred in animals, as, e.g., 
the 113 'aena of South Africa has ceased to make burrows, and so on ; 
and similarly the lodge of the beaver might have been developed out 
of such a habitation as is made by the musk rat. The author con¬ 
tinues— “As there is often much difficulty in imagining how an 
instinct could first have arisen, it may be worth while to give a few, 
out of many, cases of occasional and curious habits, which cannot be 
considered as regular instincts, but which might, according to our 
view T s, give rise to such.” After doing this, Mr. Darwin proceeds to 
consider some of the special difficulties of the subject from the point 
of view of natural selection, and finally sums up the argument in his 
usual way. His concluding words are —“ It may not be logical, but to 
my mind it is far more satisfactory, to look at the young cuckoo eject¬ 
ing its foster-brothers, ants making slaves, the larvae of the Ichneu- 
monidae feeding within the live bodies of their prey, cats playing with 
mice, otters and cormorants with living fish, not as instincts specially 
given by the Creator, but as very small parts of one general law leading 
to the advancement of all organic bodies—Multiply, Vary, let the 
Strongest Live and the Weakest Die.” 
Though this doctrine may not be in accord with our usual lines of 
thought, there can be no doubt that it is at once more logical (in spite 
of Darwin’s hesitation to make the claim in the sentence just quoted), 
and more reverent to the Creator, to suppose these things to be but 
minute details of one general plan, gradually working itself out in the 
course in which He has set it, than to picture each detail as inde¬ 
pendently fixed and considered, where, as often happens, the instinct 
only leads to its possessor’s misery or death. It may be added that, 
as may be gathered from what was said at first, this essay must not 
be regarded entirely as giving the views of its author as he would have 
set them forth, had he elaborated the subject with all the wealth of 
his later knowledge.—W. B. G. 
In another paragraph we have referred to the retirement of 
Professor Owen from his active duties. Still another veteran has 
signified that he is probably approaching the end of his long scientific 
labours. In the last number of the “ Annals and Magazine of Natural 
History ” the Bev. M. J. Berkeley, in a concluding note to his 
contribution to “British Fungi,” says that he is “glad to be able 
to make” a certain correction, “ as this is in all probability the last of 
a long series of contributions.” How long they have been our readers 
may form some idea, if we state that they commenced in 1837, in the 
“ Magazine of Zoology and Botany,” and that Mr. Berkeley has 
enumerated in them over 2,CC0 species of Fungi new to our British 
Flora. 
