CHAPTER 32 PART 3 OF PRINCIPOS OF GIOLOGY This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Recording by Sycamore Rockwell www.voinoffvoiceovers.com PRINCIPOS OF GIOLOGY by Charles Lyle Causes of earthquakes and volcanoes. Causes of earthquakes, wave-like motion. I shall now proceed to examine the manner in which the heat of the interior may give rise to earthquakes. One of the most common phenomena attending subterranean movements is the undilatory motion of the ground. And this, says Mitchell, will seem less extraordinary if we can call to mind the extreme elasticity of the earth and the compressibility of even the most solid materials. Large districts, he suggests, may rest on fluid lava, and when this is disturbed, its motions may be propagated through the incumbent rocks. He also adds the following igneous speculation. As a small quantity of vapor almost instantly generated at some considerable depth below the surface of the earth will produce a vibratory motion, so a very large quantity, whether it be generated almost instantly or in any small portion of time, will produce wave-like motion. The manner in which this wave-like motion will be propagated may in some measure be represented by the following experiment. Suppose a large cloth or carpet spread upon a floor to be raised at one edge and then suddenly brought down again to the floor. The air under it, being by this means propelled, will pass along till it escapes at the opposite side, raising the cloth in a wave all the way as it goes. In like manner, a large quantity of vapor may be conceived to raise the earth in a wave as it passes along between the strata, which it may easily separate in a horizontal direction, there being little or no cohesion between one stratum and another. The part of the earth that is first raised being bent from its natural form will endeavour to restore itself by its elasticity, and the parts next to it being to have their weight supported by the vapor, which will insinuate itself under them will be raised in their turn till it either finds some vent or is again condensed by the cold into water and by that means prevented from proceeding any further. In a memoir published in 1843 on the structure of the Appalachian chain by the Professors Rogers, the following hypothesis is proposed as simpler and more in accordance with dynamical considerations and the recorded observations on earthquakes. In place, say they, of supposing it possible for a body of vapor or gaseous matter to pass horizontally between the strata or even between the crust and the fluid lava upon which it floats and with which it must be closely entangled. We are inclined to attribute the movement to an actual pulsation engendered in the molten matter itself by a linear disruption under enormous tension, giving vent explosively to elastic vapours, escaping either to the surface or into cavernous spaces beneath. According to this supposition, the movement of the subterranean vapours would be towards and not from the disrupted belt and the oscillation of the crust would originate in the tremendous and sudden disturbance of the previous pressure on the surface of the lava mass below, brought about by the instantaneous and violent rending of the overlaying strata. This theory requires us to admit that the crust of the earth is so flexible that it can assume the form and follow the motion of an undulation in the fluid below. Even if we grant this, says Mr Mallet, another more serious objection presents itself, namely the great velocity attributed to the transit of the wave in the subterranean sea of lava. We are called upon to admit that the speed of the wave below is that of the true earthquake shock at the surface, which is so immense that it is not inferior to the velocity of sound in the same solids, but the undulation in the fluid below must follow the laws of a tidal wave or of the great sea wave already spoken of. Its velocity, like that of the tidal wave of our seas, will be a function of its length and of the depth of the fluid, diminished in this case by certain considerations as to the density and degree of acidity of the liquid, and although it would be at present impossible for want of data to calculate the exact velocity with which this subterraneous lava wave could move, it may be certainly affirmed that its velocity would be immeasurably short of the observed or etheric velocity of the great earth wave or true shock in earthquakes. Liquid gases. The rending and upheaving of continental masses are operations which are not difficult to explain. When we are once convinced that heat of sufficient power, not only to melt, but to reduce to a gaseous form, a great variety of substances is accumulated in certain parts of the interior. We see that elastic fluids are capable of projecting solid masses to immense heights in the air, and the volcano of Codopaxi has been known to throw out, to the distance of 8 or 9 miles, a mass of rock about 100 cubic yards in volume. When we observe these air reform fluids rushing out from particular vents for months or even years, continuously, what power may we expect them to exert in other places where they happen to be confined under an enormous weight of rock? The experiments of Faraday and others have shown within the last 12 years that many of these gases, including all those which are most copiously disengaged from volcanic vents, as the carbonic, sulfurous and muriatic acids may be condensed into liquids by pressure At temperatures of from 30 to 50 degrees Fahrenheit the pressure required for this purpose varies from 15 to 50 atmospheres and this amount of pressure we may regard as very insignificant in the operations of nature. A column of Vesuvian lava that would reach from the lip of the crater to the level of the sea must be equal to about 300 atmospheres so that at depths which may be termed moderate in the interior of the crust of the earth the gases may be condensed into liquids even at very high temperatures. The method employed to reduce some of these gases to a liquid state is to confine the materials from the mutual action of which they are evolved in tubes hermetically sealed so that the accumulated pressure of the vapor as it rises and expands may force some part of it to assume the liquid state. A similar process may and indeed must frequently take place in subterranean caverns and fissures or even in the pores and cells of many rocks by which means a much greater store of expansive power may be packed into a small space than could happen if these vapors had not the property of becoming liquid for although the gas occupies much less room in a liquid state yet it exerts exactly the same pressure upon the sides of the containing cavity as if it remained in the form of vapor. If a tube whether of glass or other materials filled with condensed gas have its temperature slightly raised it will often burst for a slight increment of the heat causes the elasticity of the gas to increase in a very high ratio. We have only to suppose certain rocks permeated by these liquid gases as porous strata are sometimes filled with water to have their temperature raised some hundred degrees and we obtain a power capable of lifting super incumbent masses of almost any conceivable thickness. While if the depth at which the gas is confined be great there is no reason to suppose that any other appearances would be witnessed by the inhabitants of the surface than vibratory movement and rents from which no vapor might escape. In making their way through fissures a very few miles only in length or enforcing a passage through soft yielding strata the vapors may be cooled and absorbed by water for water has a strong affinity to several of the gases and will absorb large quantities with a very slight increase of volume. In this manner the heat or the volume of springs may be augmented and their mineral properties made to vary. Connection between the state of the atmosphere and earthquakes The inhabitants of Stromboli who are mostly fishermen are said to make use of that volcano as a weather glass. The eruptions being comparatively feeble when the sky is serene but increasing in turbulence during tempestous weather so that in winter the island often seems to shake from its foundations. Mr. P. Scrope after calling attention to these and other analogous facts first started the idea as long ago as the year 1825 that the diminished pressure of the atmosphere the concomitant of stormy weather may modify the intensity of the volcanic action. He suggests that where liquid lava communicates with the surface as in the crater of Stromboli it may rise or fall in the vent on the same principle as Mercury in a barometer because the abolition or expansive power of the steam contained in the lava would be checked by every increase and augmented by every diminution of weight. In like manner if a bed of liquid lava be confined at an immense depth below the surface its expansive force may be counteracted partly by the weight of the incumbent rocks and also in part by atmospheric pressure acting contemporaneously on a vast superficial area. In that case if the abhieving force increase gradually in energy it will at length be restrained by only the slightest degree of superiority in the antagonist or repressive power and then the equilibrium may be suddenly destroyed by any cause such as an ascending draught of air. In this manner we may account for the remarkable coincidence so frequently observed between the state of the weather and subterranean commotions although it must be admitted that earthquakes and volcanic eruptions react in their turn upon the atmosphere so that disturbances of the latter are generally the consequences rather than the forerunners of volcanic disturbances. From an elaborate catalogue of the earthquakes experienced in Europe and Syria during the last fifteen centuries M. Alexis Peret has deduced the conclusion that the number which happened in the winter season preponderates over those which occur in any one of the other seasons of the year there being however some exceptions to this rule as in the Pyrenees. Curious and valuable as are these data M. Darciak justly remarks in commenting upon them that they are not as yet sufficiently extensive and important in different regions to entitle us to deduce any general conclusions from them respecting the laws of subterranean movements throughout the globe. Permanent elevation and subsidence It is easy to conceive that the shattered rocks may assume an arched form during a convulsion so that the country above may remain permanently upheaved. In other cases gas may drive before it masses of liquid lava which may thus be injected into newly opened fissures. The gas having then obtained more room by the forcing up of the incumbent rocks may remain at rest while the lava congealing in the rents may afford a solid foundation for the newly raised district. Experiments have recently been made in America by Colonel Totten to ascertain the ratio according to which some of the stones commonly used in architecture expand with given increments of heat. It was found impossible in a country where the annual variation of temperature was more than 90 degrees Fahrenheit to make a coping of stones 5 feet in length in which the joints should fit so tightly as not to admit water between the stone and the cement. The annual contraction and expansion of the stones causing at the junctions small crevices the width of which varied with the nature of the rock. It was ascertain that fine grained granite expanded with 1 degrees Fahrenheit at the rate of 0.00004825 while crystalline marble 0.00005668 and red sandstone 0.00009532 or about twice as much as granite. Now according to this law of expansion a mass of sandstone a mile in thickness which should have its temperature raised 200 degrees Fahrenheit would lift a superimposed layer of rock to the height of 10 feet above its normal level but suppose a part of the earth's crust 100 miles in thickness and equally expensive to have its temperature raised 600 degrees or 800 degrees. This might produce an elevation of between 2 to 3000 feet. The cooling off of the same mass might afterwards cause the overlaying rocks to sink down again and resume their original position by such agency we might explain the gradual rise of Scandinavia or the subsidence of Greenland if this last phenomenon should also be established as a fact on further inquiry. It is also possible that as the clay in Wedgewood's Pyrameter contracts by giving off its water and then by incipient vitrification so large masses of argulation strata on the earth's interior may shrink when subjected to heat and chemical changes that allow the incumbent rocks to subside gradually. Moreover, if we suppose that lava cooling slowly at great depths may be converted into various granitic rocks we obtain another source of depression for according to the experiments of Deville and the calculations of Bischoff the contraction of granite when passing from a melted or plastic to a solid crystalline state must be more than 10%. The sudden subsidence of land may also be occasioned by the Mediterranean caverns giving way when gases are condensed or when they escape through newly formed crevices. The subtraction, moreover, of matter from certain parts of the interior by the flowing of lava and of mineral springs must, in the course of ages, cause vacuities below so that the undermined surface may at length fall in. The balance of dry land how preserved. In the present state of our knowledge the average number of earthquakes which may happen in the course of a single year. As the area of the ocean is nearly three times that of the land it is probable that about three submarine earthquakes may occur for one exclusively continental and when we consider the great frequency of slight movements in certain districts we can hardly suppose that a day if indeed an hour ever passes without one or more shocks being experienced in some part of the globe. We have also seen that in Sweden and other countries changes in the relative level of sea and land may take place without commotion and these perhaps produce the most important geographical and geological changes for the position of land may be altered to a greater amount by an elevation or depression of one inch over a vast area than by the sinking of a more limited tract such as the forest of Aripao to the depth of many fathoms at once. It must be evident from the historical details above given that the force of subterranean movement whether intermittent or continuous whether with or without disturbance does not operate at random but is developed in certain regions only and although the alterations produced during the time required for the occurrence of a few volcanic eruptions may be inconsiderable we can hardly doubt that during the ages necessary for the formation of large volcanic cones composed of thousands of lava currents shoals might be converted into lofty mountains and low lands into deep seas. In a former chapter, page 198 I have stated that aqueous and igneous agents may be regarded as antagonist forces the aqueous laboring incessantly to reduce the inequalities of the earth's surface to a level while the igneous are equally active in renewing the unevenness of the surface. By some geologists it has been thought that the levelling power of running water was opposed rather to the elevating force of earthquakes than to their action generally. This opinion is, however, untenable for the sinking down of the bed of the ocean is one of the means by which the gradual submersion of land is prevented. The depth of the sea cannot be increased at any one point without a universal fall of the waters nor can any partial deposition of sediment occur without the displacement of a quantity of water of equal volume which will raise the sea though in an imperceptible degree even to the antipodes. The preservation, therefore, of the dry land may sometimes be affected by the subsidence of part of the earth's crust, that part namely which is covered by the ocean and in like manner an abhieving movement must often tend to destroy land for if it render the bed of the sea more shallow it will displace a certain quantity of water and thus tend to submerge low tracts. Astronomers having proved, see above, page 129 that there has been no change in the diameter of the earth during the last 2,000 years we may assume it as probable that the dimensions of the planet remain uniform. If then we inquire in what manner the force of earthquakes must be regulated in order to restore perpetually the inequalities of the surface which the levelling power of water tends to efface it will be found that the amount of depression must exceed that of elevation. It would be otherwise if the action of volcanoes and mineral springs were suspended for then the forcing outwards of the earth's envelope ought to be no more than equal to its sinking in. To understand this proposition more clearly it must be borne in mind that the deposits of rivers and currents probably add as much to the height which are rising as they take from those which have risen. Suppose a large river to bring down sediment to a part of the ocean 2,000 feet deep and that the depth of this part is gradually reduced by the accumulation of sediment till only a shore remains covered by water at high tides. If now an upheaving force should uplift this shore to the height of 2,000 feet the result would be a mountain 2,000 feet high but the movement raised the same part of the bottom of the sea before the sediment of the river had filled it up then instead of changing a shawl into a mountain 2,000 feet high it would only have converted a deep sea into a shawl. It appears then that the operations of the earthquake are often such as to cause the levelling power of water to counteract itself and although the idea may appear paradoxical we may be sure whenever we find hills and mountains composed of stratified deposits that such inequalities of the surface would have had no existence if water at some form a period had not been labelling to reduce the earth surface to one level but besides the transfer of matter by running water from the continents to the ocean there is a constant transportation from below upwards by mineral springs and volcanic vents. As mountain masses are in the course of ages created by a pouring forth of successive streams of lava so stratified rocks of great extent originate from the deposition of carbonite of lime and other mineral ingredients with which springs are impregnated. The surface of the land and portions of the bottom of the sea being thus raised the external accessions due to these operations would cause the dimensions of the planet to enlarge continuously if the amount of depression of the earth's crust were no more than equal to the elevation in order therefore that the mean diameter of the earth should remain uniform and the unevenness of the surface be preserved it is necessary that the amount of subsidence should be in excess and such a predominance of depression is far from improbable on mechanical principles since every upheaving movement must be expected either to produce caverns in the mass below or to cause some diminution of its density vacuities must also arise from the subtraction of the matter poured out from volcanoes and mineral springs or from the contraction of argulation's masses by subterranean heat and the foundations having been thus weakened the earth's crust shaken and rent by reiterated convulsions must in course of time fall in if we embrace these views important geological consequences will follow since if there be upon the whole more subsidence than evillation the average depth to which former surfaces have sunk beneath their original level must exceed the height which ancient marine strata have attained above the sea if for example marine strata about the age of our chalk and greensand have been lifted up in Europe to an extreme height of more than 11,000 feet and a mean elevation of some hundreds we may conclude that certain parts of the surface which existed when those strata were deposited have sunk to an extreme depth of more than 11,000 feet below their original level and to a mean depth of more than a few hundreds in regard to faults also we must infer according to the hypothesis now proposed that a greater number have arisen from the sinking down than from the elevation of rocks to conclude it seems to be rendered probable by the views above explained constant repair of the land and a subservience of our planet to the support of terrestrial as well as aquatic species are secured by the elevating and depressing power of causes acting in the interior of the earth which although so often the source of death and terror to the inhabitants of the globe visiting in succession every zone and filling the earth with monuments of ruin and disorder are nevertheless the agents of a conservative principle all others essential to the stability of the system End of Chapter 32 Part 3 Recording by Sycamore Rockwell www.VoinalVoiceovers.com Chapter 33 of Principles of Geology This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Principles of Geology by Charles Lyle Book 3 Changes of the organic world now in progress Division of the subject Examination of the question Whether species have a real existence in nature Importance of this question in geology Sketch of Lamarck's arguments in favor of the transmutation of species and his conjectures respecting the origin of existing animals and plants His theory of the transformation of the orangutan into the human species The last book, from chapters 14 to 33 inclusive was occupied with the consideration of the changes brought about on the Earth's surface within the period of human observation by unorganic agents such, for example, as rivers, marine currents volcanoes, and earthquakes But there is another class of phenomena relating to the organic world which have an equal claim on our attention if we desire to obtain possession of all the preparatory knowledge respecting the existing course of nature which may be available in the interpretation of geological monuments It appeared from our preliminary sketch of the progress of the science the most lively interest was excited among its earlier cultivators by the discovery of the remains of animals and plants and the interior amounts frequently remote from the sea Much controversy arose respecting the nature of these remains the causes which may have brought them into so singular opposition and the want of a specific agreement between them and known animals and plants To qualify ourselves to form just views on these curious questions we must first study the present condition of the animate creation on the globe This branch of our inquiry naturally divides itself into two parts First, we may examine the vicissitudes to which species are subject Secondly, the processes by which certain individuals of these species have occasionally become fossil The first of these divisions will lead us, among other topics to inquire, first if species have a real and permanent existence in nature or whether they are capable, as some naturalists pretend being indefinitely modified in the course of a long series of generations Secondly, whether if species have a real existence the individuals composing them have been derived originally from many similar stocks for each from one only the descendants of which have spread themselves gradually from a particular point over the habitable lands and waters Thirdly, how far the duration of each species of animal and plant is limited by its dependence on certain fluctuating and temporary conditions in the state of the animate and inanimate world Fourthly, whether there be proofs of the successive extermination of species in the ordinary course of nature and whether there be any reason for conjecturing that new animals and plants are created from time to time to supply their place whether species have a real existence in nature Before we can advance the step in our proposed inquiry we must be able to define precisely the meaning which we attach to the term species This is even more necessary in geology than in the ordinary studies of the naturalist for they who deny such a thing as a species exist can see nevertheless that a botanist or zoologist may reason as if the specific character were constant because they can find their observations to a brief period of time just as a geographer in constructing his maps from century to century may proceed as if the apparent places of the fixed stars remain absolutely the same and as if no alteration were brought about by the procession of the equinoxes So, it is said, in the Orianic world the stability of a species may be taken as absolute if we do not extend our views beyond the narrow period of human history but let a sufficient number of centuries elapse to allow of important revolutions in climate, physical geography and other circumstances and the characters, say they of the descendants of common parents may deviate indefinitely from their original type Now, if these doctrines be tenable we are at once presented with a principle of incessant change in the organic world and no degree of dissimilarity in the plants and animals which may formally have existed and are found fossil when title us to conclude that they have not been the prototypes and progenitors of the species now living Accordingly, Geoffrey St. Hilaire has declared his opinion that there has been an uninterrupted succession in the animal kingdom affected by means of generation from the earliest ages of the world up to the present day and that the ancient animals whose moraines have been preserved in the strata, however different may nevertheless have been the ancestors of those now in being This notion is not very generally received we are not warranted in assuming the contrary without fully explaining the data and reasoning by which it may be refuted I shall begin by stating as concisely as possible all the facts and ingenious arguments by which the theory has been supported and for this purpose I cannot do better than offer the reader a rapid sketch of Lamarck's statement of the proofs which he regards as confirmatory of the doctrine in which he has derived partly from the works of his predecessors and in part from original investigations His proofs and inferences will be best considered in the order in which they appear to have influenced his mind and I shall then point out some of the results to which he was led while boldly following out his principles to their legitimate consequences Lamarck's arguments in favor of the transmutation of species The name of species, observed Lamarck has been usually applied to every collection of similar individuals produced by other individuals like themselves This definition, he admits, is correct because every living individual bears a very close resemblance to those from which it springs but this is not all which is usually implied by the term species for the majority of naturalists agree with Linnaeus in supposing that all the individuals propagated from one stock have certain distinguishing characters in common which will never vary in which have remained the same since the creation of each species In order to shake this opinion, Lamarck enters upon the following line of argument The more we advance in the knowledge of the different organized bodies which cover the surface of the globe the more our embarrassment increases to determine what ought to be regarded as a species and still more how to limit and distinguish genera Since as our collections are enriched we see almost every void filled up and all our lines of separation effaced We are reduced to arbitrary determinations that are sometimes feigned to seize upon the slight differences of mere varieties in order to form characters for what we choose to call a species and sometimes we are induced to pronounce individuals but slightly differing and which others regard as true species to be varieties The greater the abundance of natural objects assembled together the more do we discover proofs that everything passes by insensible shades into something else that even the more remarkable differences are evanescent and that nature has, for the most part left us nothing at our disposal for establishing distinctions, safe trifling and in some respects, here are our particularities We find that many genera amongst animals and plants are of such an extent in consequence of the number of species referred to them that the study and determination of these last become almost impracticable When the species are arranged in a series and placed near to each other with due regard to their natural affinities they each differ and so minute a degree from the next adjoining that they almost melt into each other and are in a manner confounded together If we see isolated species we may presume the absence of some more closely connected which have not yet been discovered Already are there genera and even entire orders they, whole classes represent an approximation to the state of things here indicated If, when species have been thus placed in a regular series we select one and then, making a leap over several intermediate ones we take a second at some distance from the first that these two will, on comparison be seen to be very dissimilar and it is in this manner that every naturalist begins to study the objects which are at his own door He then finds it an easy task to establish generic and specific distinctions and that is only when his experience is enlarged and when he has made himself master of the intermediate links that his difficulties and ambiguities begin But while we are thus compelled to resort to trifling and minute characters in our attempt to separate the species we find a striking disparity between individuals which we know to have decided from a common stock and these newly acquired peculiarities are regularly transmitted from one generation to another constituting what are called races From a great number of facts continues the author we learn that in proportion as the individuals of one of our species change their situation, climate, and manner of living they change also, by little and little the consistence and proportions of their parts, their form their faculties, and even their organization in such a manner that everything in them comes at last to participate in the mutations to which they have been exposed Even in the same climate a great difference of situation and exposure causes individuals to vary But if these individuals continue to live and to be reproduced under the same difference of circumstances distinctions are brought about in them which become in some degree essential to their existence In a word, at the end of many successive generations these individuals which originally belonged to another species are transformed into a new and distinct species Thus, for example, if the seeds of a grass or any other plant which grows naturally in a moist meadow be accidentally transported first the slope of some neighboring hill where the soil, although at a greater elevation is damp enough to allow the plant to live And if, after having lived there and having been several times regenerated it reaches by degrees the drier and almost arid soil of a mountain declivity It will then, if it succeeds in growing and perpetuates itself for a series of generations, be so changed that botanists who meet with it will regard it as a particular species The unfavorable climate in this case deficiency of nourishment, exposure to the winds and other causes give rise to a stunted and dwarfish race with some organ more developed than others and having proportions often quite peculiar When nature brings about in a great lapse of time we occasion suddenly by changing the circumstances in which a species has been accustomed to live All are aware that vegetables taken from their birthplace and cultivated in gardens undergo changes which render them no longer recognizable as the same plants Many which were naturally hairy became smooth or nearly so A great number of such were creepers and trelled along the ground, reared their stalks and grow erect Others lose their thorns or asperities Others, again, from the lignia state which their stem possessed in hot climates where they were indigenous passed to the herbaceous and, among them, some which were perennials became mere annuals So well do botanists know the effects of such changes of circumstance that they are averse to described species and specimens unless they are sure that they have been cultivated for a very short period It is not the cultivated wheat Trudecum savatum, a vegetable brought by man into the state which we now see it Let anyone tell me in what country a similar plant grows wild unless where it has escaped from cultivated fields Where do we find in nature are cabbages, leises and other culinary vegetables in the state in which they appear in our gardens Is it not the same in regard to a great quantity of animals which domesticity has changed or considerably modified Our domestic fowls and pigeons are unlike any wild birds Our domestic ducks and geese have lost the faculty of raising themselves into the higher regions of the air and crossing extensive countries in their flight like the wild ducks and wild geese for which they were originally derived A bird which we breed in a cage cannot, when restored to liberty fly like others of the same species which have always been free This small alteration of circumstances, however has only diminished the power of flight without modifying the form of any part of the wings While individuals of the same race are retaining captivity during a considerable length of time the form even of their parts is gradually made to differ especially of climate, nourishment and other circumstances be also altered The numerous races of dogs which we have produced by domesticity are nowhere to be found in a wild state In nature we should seek for vein and mastiffs Harriers, spaniels, greyhounds and other races between which the differences are sometimes so great that they would be readily admitted as specific between wild animals Yet all these have sprung originally from a single race a first approaching very near to a wolf if indeed The wolf be not the true type which at some period or other was domesticated by man Although import changes in the nature of the places which they inhabit modify the organization of animals as well as vegetables yet the former, Cecil Mark had more time to complete a considerable degree of transmutation and consequently there are less sensible of such occurrences Next to a diversity of the medium in which animals or plants may live the circumstances which have most influence in modifying their organs are differences in exposure, climate the nature of the soil and other local particulars These circumstances are as varied as are the characters of the species and like them there being every intermediate gradiation between the opposite extremes but each locality remains for a very long time the same and is altered so slowly that we can only become conscious of the reality of the change by consulting geological monuments by which we learn that the order of things which how race in place is not always prevailed and by inference anticipate that it will not always continue the same every considerable alteration in the local circumstances in which each race of animals exists causes a change in their wants and these new wants excite them to new actions and habits these actions acquire the more frequent employment of some parts before but slightly exercised and then greater development follows as a consequence of their more frequent use. Other organs no longer in use are impoverished and diminished in size nay are sometimes entirely annihilated while in their place new parts are insensibly produced for the discharge of new functions. I must here interrupt the author's argument by observing that no positive fact is cited to exemplify the substitution of some entirely new sense faculty or organ in the realm of some other suppressed as useless all the instances adduced go only to prove that the dimensions and strength of members and the perfection of certain attributes may in a long succession of generations be lessened and enfeebled by disuse or on the concherry be matured and augmented by active exertion just as we know that the power of scent is feeble in the gray hound while its swiftness of pace and acuteness of sight are remarkable that the harrier and stag bound on the concherry are comparatively slow in their movements but excel in the sense of smelling. It was necessary to point out to the reader this important chasm in the chain of evidence because he might otherwise imagine that I had merely omitted the illustrations for the sake of brevity but the plain truth is that there were no examples to be found and when Lamarck talks of the efforts of internal sentiment the influence of subtle fluids and acts of organization as causes whereby animals and plants may acquire new organs he substitutes name for things and with a disregard to the strict rules of induction resorts to fictions as ideal as the plastic virtue and other phantoms of the geologists of the middle ages. It is evident that if some well authenticated facts could have been induced to establish one complete step in the process of transformation such as the appearance and individuals descending from a common stock of a sensual organ entirely new and complete disappearance of some other enjoyed by their progenitors time alone might then be supposed sufficient to bring about any amount of metamorphosis. The gratuitous assumption therefore of a point so vital to the theory of transportation was unpardonable on the part of its advocate but to proceed with the system it is being assumed as an undoubted fact that a change of external circumstances may cause one organ to become entirely obsolete and a new one to be developed such as never before belonged to the species the following proposition is announced which however staggering and absurd it may seem is logically deduced from the assumed premises it is not the organs or in any other words the nature and form of the parts of the body of an animal which have gone to rise to its habits and its particular faculties but on the contrary its habits its manner of living and those of its progenitors have in the course of time determined the form of the body the number and condition of its organs in short the faculties which it enjoys thus otters beavers waterfowl turtles and frogs were not made to be webfooted in order that they might swim but their wants having attracted them to the water in search of prey they stretched out the toes of their feet to strike the water and move rapidly along its surface rather repeated stretching up their toes the skin which united them at the base acquired a habit of extension until in the course of time the broad membranes which now connect their extremities were formed in like manner the antelope and the gazelle were not endowed with light agile forms in order that they might escape by flight from carnivorous animals but having been exposed to the danger of being devoured by lions, tigers and other beasts of prey they were compelled to exert themselves in running with great celerity of many generations gave rise to the peculiar slenderness of their legs and the agility and elegance of their forms the camel apart was not gifted with a long flexible neck because it was destined to live in the interior of Africa where the soil was erred and devoid of herbage but being reduced by the nature of that country to support itself on the foliage of lofty trees it contracted a habit of stretching itself up to reach the high boughs until its neck became so elongated that it could raise its head to the height of 20 feet above the ground another line of argument is then entered upon in further corroboration of the instability of species in order it is said that individuals should perpetuate themselves and all their my generation those belonging to one species are never to ally themselves to those of another but such sexual unions do take place both among plants and animals and although the offspring of such regular connections are usually sterile yet such is not always the case which have sometimes proved prolific where the disparity between the species was not too great and by this means alone Teslemarch varieties may gradually be created by near alliances which would become races and in the course of time would constitute what these terms species but if the soundness of all these arguments and inferences be admitted we are next to inquire what were the original types of form, organization and instinct from which the diversities of character as now exhibited by animals and plants have been derived we know that individuals which are mere varieties of the same species would if their pedigree to be traced back far enough terminate in a single stock so according to the train of reasoning before described the species of a genus and even the genera of the great family must have had a common point of departure what then was a single stem from which so many varieties of form have ramified were there many of these or are we to refer to the origin of the whole animate creation is the egyptian priestate of that universe to a single egg in the absence of any positive data for framing a theory on so obscure a subject following considerations were deemed of importance to guide conjecture in the first place if we examine the whole series of known animals from one extremity to the other when they are arranged in the order of the natural relations we find that we may pass progressively or at least with very few interruptions from beings of more simple structure and in proportion as a complexity of their organization increases the number and dignity of their faculties increase also among plants a similar approximation to a graduated scale of being is apparent secondly it appears from geological observations that plants and animals of more simple organization existed on the globe before the appearance of those of more compound structure and the latter were successfully formed at more modern periods each new race being more fully developed that the most perfect of the preceding era of the truth of the last mentioned geological theory Lamarck seemed to have been fully persuaded and he also shows that he was deeply impressed with a belief prevalent among the older naturalists that the primeval ocean invested the whole planet long after it became the habitation of living beings and thus he was inclined to assert the priority of the types of marine animals to those of the terrestrial so as to fancy for example at the testesia of the ocean existed first until some of them by gradual evolution were improved into those inhabiting the land these speculative views had already been in a great degree anticipated by de Malier and his tele-emit and by several modern writers so that the tables were completely turned on the philosophers of antiquity with whom it was a received maxim that created things were always most perfect when they came first from the hands of their maker and that there was a tendency to progress a deterioration and sub-lunary things when left to themselves so deeply was the faith of the ancient schools of philosophy and viewed with this doctrine that to check this universal proneness to degeneracy nothing less than the re-intervention of the deity was thought adequate and it was held that thereby the order excellence and pristine energy of the moral and physical world had been repeatedly restored but when the possibility of the indefinite modification of individuals descending from common parents was once assumed as also the geological inference respecting the progressive development of organic life it was natural that the ancient dogma should be rejected or rather reversed and that the most simple and imperfect forms and faculties should be conceived to have been the originals once all others were developed accordingly in conformity to these views inert matter was supposed to happen first endowed with life until in the course of ages sensation was super-added to mere vitality sight, hearing, and the other senses were afterwards acquired and instinct and the mental faculties until finally by virtue of the tendency of things to progressive improvement the irrational was developed in the rational the reader however will immediately perceive that when all the higher orders of plants and animals were thus supposed to be comparatively modern and to have been derived in a long series of generations from those of more simple confirmation some farther hypotheses become indispensable in order to explain why after an indefinite lapse of ages there were so many beings of the simplest structure why have the majority of existing creatures remain stationary throughout this long succession of epochs while others have made such prodigious advances why are there such multitudes of infusoria and polyps or of confervet and other cryptogonic plants why moreover has the process of development act with such unequal and irregular force on those classes of beings which have been greatly perfected so that there are wide chasms in the series, gaps so enormous that Lamaric fairly admits that we can never expect to fill them up by future discoveries the following hypothesis was provided to meet these objections nature we are told is not an intelligence nor the deity but a delegated power a mere instrument a piece of mechanism acting by necessity in order of things constituted by the supreme being and subject to laws which are the expressions of his will this nature is obliged to proceed gradually in all her operations she cannot produce animals and plants of all classes at once but must always begin by the formation of the most simple kinds and out of them elaborate the more compound adding to them successively different systems of organs and multiplying more and more at the number and energy this nature is daily engaged in the formation of the elementary rudiments of animal and vegetable existence which correspond to what the ancients termed spontaneous generation she is always beginning anew day by day the work of creation by forming monads or rough draft a box which are the only living things she gives birth to directly there are distinct primary rudiments of plants and animals and probably of each of the great divisions of the animal and vegetable kingdoms these are gradually developed into the higher and more perfect classes by the slow but unceasing agency of two influential principles first tendency to progressive advancement in organization accompanied by greater dignity in instinct intelligence etc secondly the force of external circumstances or variations in the physical condition of the earth or the mutual relations of plants and animals four as species spread themselves gradually over the globe they are exposed from time to time to variations in climate and the changes in the quantity and quality of their food they meet with new plants and animals which assist or retard their development by supplying them with nutriment or destroying their foes the nature also of each locality is in itself fluctuating so that even if the relation of other plants and animals were invariable the inhabitants organization of species would be modified by the influence of local revolutions now if the first of these principles the tendency to progressive development were left to exert itself with perfect freedom it would give rise says Lamarck in the course of ages to a graduated scale of being where the most insensible transition might be traced from the simplest to the most compound structure from the humblest to the most exalted degree of intelligence but in consequence of the actual interference of the external causes before mentioned this regular order is really interfered with and an approximation only such a state of things is exhibited by the animate creation the progress of some races being retarded by unfavorable and that of others accelerated by favorable combinations of circumstances hence all kinds of anomalies interrupt the continuity of the plan and chasms into which the whole genera or families might be inserted are seen to operate the nearest existing portions of the series the marks theory of the transformation of the orangutan into the human species such as the machinery of the Lamarckian system but the reader will hardly perhaps be able to form a perfect conception of so complicated a piece of mechanism unless it is exhibited in motion so that we may see in what manner it can work out under the author's guidance all the extraordinary effects to be behold in the present state of the animate creation I have only space for exhibiting a small part of the entire process by which a complete metamorphosis is achieved and shall therefore omit the mode by which after countless succession of generations a small gelatinous body is transformed into an oak or an ape passing on at once to the last grand step on the progressive scheme by which the orangutan having been already evolved out of a monad is made slowly to attain the attributes and dignity of man one of the races of quadrimenous animals which had reached the highest state of perfection lost by constraint of circumstances concerning the exact nature of which tradition is unfortunately silent the habit of climbing trees and of hanging on by grasping the boughs with their feet as with hands the individuals of this race being obliged for a long series of generations to use their feet exclusively for walking and ceasing to employ their hands as feet were transformed into bimonous animals and what before were thumbs became your toes no separation being required when their feet were used solely for walking having acquired a habit of holding themselves upright their legs and feet assumed insensibly the conformation fitted to support them in an erect attitude till at last these animals could no longer go on all fours without much inconvenience the Angola orang semiotroglodytes Linnaeus is the most perfect of animals much more so the Indian orang semioceturus which has been called the orangutan although both are very inferior to man in corporeal powers and intelligence these animals frequently hold themselves upright but the organization has not yet been sufficiently modified to sustain them habitually in this attitude so that standing posture is very uneasy to them when the Indian orang is compelled to take flight from pressing danger he immediately falls down upon all fours showing clearly that this was the original position of the animal even in man whose organization in the course of a long series of generations has advanced so much farther the upright posture is fatiguing and can be supported only for a limited time and by the aid of the contraction of many muscles if the vertical column form the axis of the human body has supported the head and all the other parts in equilibrium then might the upper position be a state of repose but as the human head does not articulate in the center of gravity as the chest, belly and other parts press almost entirely forward with their whole weight and as the vertical column reposes upon an oblique base a watchful activity is required to prevent the body from falling children who have large heads and prominent bellies can hardly walk at the end even of two years and their frequent tumbles indicate the natural tendency in man to resume the quadrupedal state now, when so much progress has been made by the quadrumanus animals before mentioned that they could hold themselves habitually in an erect attitude and were accustomed to a wide range of vision they used to use their jaws for fighting and tearing or for clipping herbs for food thus now it became gradually shorter their incisor teeth became vertical and the facial angle grew more open among other ideas which the natural tendency to perfection and gendered the desire of ruling suggested itself and this race succeeded at length in getting the better of the other animals and made themselves master of all those spots on the surface of the globe which best suited them they drove out the animals which approached nearest them in a condition to dispute with them the good things of this world forcing them to take refuge in deserts woods and wildernesses where their multiplication was checked and the progressive development of their faculties retarded while in the meantime the dominant race spread itself in every direction and lived in large companies where new moths were successfully created exciting them to industry and gradually perfecting their means and faculties in the supremacy and increased intelligence acquired by the ruling race we see an illustration of the natural tendency of the organic world to grow more perfect and in their influence in repressing the advance of others an example of one of those disturbing causes before enumerated that force of external circumstances which causes such wide chasms in the regular series of animated being when the individuals of the dominant race become very numerous their ideas greatly increased in number and they felt the necessity of communicating them to each other and of augmenting and varying the signs proper for the communication of ideas meanwhile the inferior quadrimanus animals although most of them were gregarious acquired no new ideas being persecuted and restless in the deserts and obliged to fly and conceal themselves so that they can see if no new wants such ideas as they already had remained unaltered and they could dispense with the communication of the greater part of these to make themselves therefore understood by their fellows acquired merely a few movements of the body or limbs whistling on the uttering of certain cries varied by the inflections of the voice on the contrary the individuals of the ascendent race animated with the desire of interchanging their ideas which became more and more numerous were prompted to multiply the means of communication and were no longer satisfied with mere pantomimic signs nor even with all the possible inflections of the voice but made continual efforts to acquire the power of uttering articulate sounds employing a few at first but afterwards varying and perfecting them according to the increase of their wants the habitual exercise of their throat tongue and lips insensibly modified the conformation of these organs until they became fitted for the faculty of speech in effecting this mighty change the exigencies of the individuals were the sole agents they gave rise to efforts and the organ proper for articulating sounds were developed by their habitual employment hence in this peculiar race the origin of the admirable faculty of speech hence also the diversity of languages since distances of places where the individuals composing the race established themselves soon favored the corruption of conventional signs in conclusion it may be proper to observe that the above sketch of the Lamarckian theory is no exaggerated picture and those passages which have been probably excited the greatest surprise in the mind of the reader are literal translations from the original End of chapter 33 chapter 34 part 1 of principles of geology this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org principles of geology by Charles Liao transportation of species continued recapitulation of the arguments in favor of the theory of transportation of species their insufficiency causes of difficulty in discriminating species some varieties possibly more distinct than certain individuals of distinct species variability in a species consistent with the belief that the limits of the deviation are fixed no effects of transmutation authenticated varieties of the dog the dog and wolf distinct species mummies of various animals from Egypt identical in character with living animals seeds and plants from the Egyptian tombs modifications produced in plants by agriculture and gardening the theory of the transportation of species considered in the last chapter has met with some degree of favor from many naturalists from the desire to dispense as far as possible with the repeated intervention of a first cause as often as geological monuments attests the successive appearances of new races of animals and plants and the extinction of those pre-existing but independently of predisposition to account if possible for a series of changes in the organic world by the regular action of secondary causes we have seen that in truth many perplexing difficulties present themselves to one who attempts to establish the nature and reality of the specific character and if once there appears ground of reasonable doubt in regard to the constant sea of the species the amount of transformation which they are capable of undergoing may seem to resolve itself into a mere question of the quantity of time assigned to the past duration of animate existence before entering upon the reasons which may be adduced for rejecting Lamarck's hypothesis as shall recapitulate in a few words the phenomena and the whole train of thought by which I conceive it to have been suggested and which have gained for this an analogous theories both in ancient and modern times a considerable number of votaries in the first place the various groups into which plants and animals may be thrown and seem almost invariably to beginner to be so natural that he is usually convinced at first as was Linnaeus to the last that genera are as much founded in nature as the species which compose them when by examining the more numerous intermediate gradations the student finds all lines of demarcation to be in most instances obliterated even when they at first appear most distinct he grows more and more skeptical as to the real existence of genera and finally regards them as mere arbitrary and artificial signs invented like those who serve to distinguish the heavenly constellations for the convenience of classification and having as little pretensions to reality doubts are then engendered in his mind as to other species may not also be equally unreal the student is probably first struck with a phenomenon that some individuals are made to deviate widely from the ordinary type by the force of such peculiar circumstances and with the still more extraordinary fact that the newly acquired peculiarities are faithfully transmitted to the offspring how far he asks may such variations extend in the course of indefinite periods of time and during great vicissitudes in the physical condition of the globe his growing in certitude is at first checked by the reflection that nature has forbidden the intermixture of the descendants of distinct original stocks or has at least and held sterility on their offspring thereby preventing their being co-tounded together pointing out that a multitude of distinct types must have been created in the beginning and must have remained pure and uncorrupted to this day relying on this general law he endeavors to solve each difficult problem by direct experiment until he is again astounded by the phenomenon of a prolific hybrid and still more by an example of a hybrid perpetuating itself throughout several generations in the vegetable world he then feels himself reduced to the dilemma of choosing between two alternatives either to reject the test or to declare that the two species from the union of which the first fruitful progeny has sprung were mere varieties if he prefer the latter he is compelled to question the reality of the distinctness of all other supposed species which differ no more than the parents of such prolific hybrids for although he may not be enabled immediately to procure and all such instances a fruitful offspring yet experiments show that after repeated failures the union of two recognized species may at last under very favorable circumstances give birth to a fertile progeny such circumstances therefore the naturals may conceive to have occurred again and again in the course of a great lapse of ages his first opinions are now fairly unsettled and every state at which he has caught has given way one after another he is in danger of falling into any new and visionary doctrine which may be presented to him for he now regards every part of the animate creation as a void of stability and in a state of continual flux in this mood he encounters the geologist who relates to him how there have been endless vicissitudes in the shape and structure of organic beings in former ages how the approach to the present system of things has been gradual that there has been a progressive development of organizations observant to the purposes of life in the most simple to the most complex state that the appearance of man is the last phenomenon in a long succession of events and finally that a series of physical revolutions can be traced in the inorganic world co-evil and co-extensive with those of organic nature these use seem immediately to confirm all his preconceived doubts as to the stability of the specific character and he begins to think that there may exist an inseparable connection between a series of changes in the inanimate world and the capability of the species to be indefinitely modified by the influence of external circumstances henceforth the speculations know no definite bounds he gives the reign to conjecture outward form, internal structure instinctive faculties, nay that reason itself may have been gradually developed from some of the simplest states of existence that all animals, that man himself and the irrational beings may have had one common origin but all may be parts of one continuous and progressive scheme of development from the most imperfect to the more complex in Finae he renounces his belief in the high genealogy of a species and looks forward to its manifestation to the future perfect ability of man and his physical, intellectual and moral attributes let us now proceed to consider what is defective in evidence and what fallacious in reasoning in the grounds of these strange conclusions Blum and Vok judiciously observes that no general rule can be laid down for determining the distinctness of species as there is no particular class of characters which can serve as criterion in each case we must be guided by analogy and probability the multitude in fact the complexity of the proofs to be weighed is so great we can only hope to obtain presumptive evidence and we must therefore be the more careful to derive our general views as much as possible from those observations where the chances of deception are leased we must be on our guard not the tread in the footsteps of the naturalists of the middle ages who believe the doctrine of spontaneous generation to be applicable to all those parts of the animal and vegetable kingdoms which they at least understood in direct contradiction to the analogy of all the parts best known to them and who, when at length they found that insects and cryptogamous plants were also propagated from eggs or seeds, still persisted in retaining their old prejudices respecting the infusory animal cues and other minute beings, generation of which then had not been demonstrated by the microscope to be governed by the same laws Lamar Kaz, indeed attempted to raise an argument in favor of his system which is very confusing which has arisen in the study of some orders of animals and plants in consequence of the slight shades of difference which separate the new species discovered in the last half century that is the embarrassment of those who attempt to classify and distinguish the new acquisitions poured in such multitudes into our museums should increase with the augmentation of their number, it's quite natural since to obviate this it is not enough that our powers of discrimination should keep pace with the increase of the objects but we ought to possess greater opportunities of studying each animal and plant at all stages of its growth and to know profoundly their history, their habits and physiological characters throughout several generations for in proportion as a series of known animals grows more complete none can doubt there is a near approximation to a graduated scale of being and thus the most closely allied species will be found to possess a greater number of characters in common causes of the difficulty of discriminating species but in point of fact our new acquisitions consist more and more as we advance where specimens brought from foreign and often very distant and barbarous countries a large proportion have never even been seen alive by scientific inquirers instead of having specimens of the young the adult and the aged individual of each sex possessing means of investigating the anatomical structure the peculiar habits and the instincts of each what is usually the state of our information a single specimen perhaps of a dried plant or a stuffed bird or a quadruped a shell without the soft parts of the animal an insect at one stage of its numerous transformations these are the scanty and imperfect data which the naturalist possesses such information may enable us to separate species which stand at a considerable distance from each other we have no right to expect anything but difficulty and ambiguity if we attempt from such imperfect opportunities who obtain distinctive marks for defining the characters of species which are closely related if Lamar could introduce so much certainty and precision into the classification of several thousand species of recent and fossil shells notwithstanding the extreme remoteness of the organization of these animals from the type of those vertebrate species which are best known and in the absence of so many of the living inhabitants of shells we are led to form an exalted conception of the degree of exactness to which imperfect decisions are capable of being carried rather than to call and question their reality when our data are so defective the most acute naturalist must expect to be sometimes at fault and like the novice to overlook essential parts of difference passing unconsciously from one species to another until like one who is born along in a current he is astonished on looking back at observing that he has reached a point so remote from that once he set out it is by no means improbable when the series of species of a certain genera is very full may be found to differ less widely from each other and do the mere varieties or races of certain species if such a fact could be established it would undoubtedly diminish the chance of our obtaining certainty in our results but it would by no means overthrow our confidence and the reality of species some mere varieties possibly more distinct than certain individuals of distinct species it is almost necessary indeed to suppose that varieties will differ in some cases more decidedly than some species if we admit that there is a graduated scale of being and assume that the following laws prevail in the economy of the animate creation first that the organization of individuals is capable of being modified to a limited extent by the force of external causes secondly that these modifications are to a certain extent transmissible to their offspring thirdly that there are fixed limits on which the descendants from common parents can never deviate from a certain type fourthly that each species springs from one original stock and can never be permanently confounded by intermixing with the progeny of any other stock fifthly that each species shall endure for a considerable period of time now let us assume for the present these rules hypothetically and see what consequences may naturally be expected to result from them we must suppose that when the author of nature creates an animal or plant the possible circumstances in which its descendants are destined to live are foreseen and that an organization is conferred upon it which will enable the species to perpetuate itself and survive under all the varying circumstances to which it must be inevitably exposed now the range of variation of circumstances will differ essentially in almost every case let us take for example any one of the most influential conditions of existence such as temperature in some extensive districts near the equator the thermometer might never vary throughout several thousand centuries for more than 20 degrees Fahrenheit so that if a plant or animal be provided with an organization fitting to it to endure such a range it may continue on the globe for that immense period although every individual might be liable at once to be cut off by the least possible excess of heat or cold beyond the determinable degree but if a species be placed in one of the temperate zones and have a constitution conferred on it capable of supporting a similar range it will inevitably perish before a single year has passed away Humboldt has shown that at Cumana within the tropics there is a difference of only 4 degrees Fahrenheit between the temperature of the warmest and coldest months whereas in the temperate zones the annual variation amounts to about 60 degrees on the extreme range of the thermometer in Canada is not less than 90 degrees the same remark might be applied to any other condition as food for example it may be foreseen that the supply will be regular throughout indefinite periods in one part of the world and in another very precarious and fluctuating both in kind and quantity different qualifications may be required for enabling species to live for a considerable time under circumstances so changeable if then temperature and food be among these external causes which according to certain laws of animal and vegetable physiology modify the organization form or faculties of individuals we instantly perceive that the degrees of variability from a common standard must differ widely in the two cases above supposed since there is a necessity of accommodating a species in one case to a much greater latitude of circumstances than the other if it be a law for instance that scanty sustenance should check these individuals in their growth which are unable to accommodate themselves to privations of this kind and that a parent prevention in this manner from obtaining the size proper to its species should produce a dwarfage offspring a stunted race will arise as is remarkably exemplified in some varieties of the horse and dog the difference of stature in some races of dogs and compared to others is as one to five in linear dimensions making a difference of a hundred fold in volume now there is good reason to believe that species in general are by no means susceptible of existing under a diversity of circumstances which may give rise to such a disparity in size and consequently there will be a multitude of distinct species of which no two adult individuals can ever depart so wildly from a certain standard of dimensions as the mere varieties of a certain other species the dog for instance now we have only to suppose that what is true of size may also hold in regard to color and many other attributes and it will at once follow that the degree of possible discordance between varieties of the same species may in certain areas exceed the utmost disparity which can arise between two individuals of many distinct species the same remarks may hold true in regard to instincts for if it be foreseen that one species will have to encounter a great variety of foes it may be necessary to arm it with great cunning and circumspection or with courage or other qualities capable of developing themselves on certain occasions such for example as those migratory instincts which are so remarkably exhibited at particular periods after they have remained dormant for many generations the history and habits of one variety of such a species may often differ more considerably from some other than those of many distinct species which have no latitude of accommodation to circumstances extent of known variability in species Lamar has somewhat misstated the idea commonly entertained of a species for it is not true that naturalists in general assume that the organization of an animal or plant remains absolutely constant and that it can never vary in any of its parts almost be aware that circumstances influence the habits and that the habits may alter the state of the parts and organs but the difference of opinion relates to the extent to which these modifications of the habits and organs of a particular species may be carried now let us first inquire what positive facts can be induced in the history of known species to establish a great and permanent amount of change in the form structure or instinctive individuals descending from some common stock the best authenticated examples of the extent to which species can be made to vary may be looked for in the history of domesticated animals and cultivated plants it usually happens that those species both of the animal and vegetable kingdom which have the greatest pliability of organization those which are most capable of accommodating themselves to a great variety of new circumstances are most serviceable to man these only can be carried by him into different climates and can have their properties or instincts variously diversified by differences in habits if the resources of a species be so limited and its habits and faculties be of such confined and local character that it can only flourish in a few particular spots it can rarely be of great utility we may consider therefore that in the domestication of animals and the cultivation of plants mankind have first elected those species which have the most flexible frames and constitutions and have then engaged for ages in conducting a series of experiments with much patience and at great cost to asserting what may be the greatest possible deviation from a common type which can be elicited in these extreme cases varieties of the dog no transportation the modifications produced in the different races of dog exhibit the influence of man in the most striking point of view these animals have been transported into every climate and placed in every variety of circumstances they have been made as a modern naturalist observes the servant the companion the guardian and the intimate friend of man and the power of superior genius has had a wonderful influence not only on their forms but on their manners and intelligence different races have undergone remarkable changes in the quantity and color of their clothing the dogs of guinea are almost naked while those of the arctic circle are covered with a warm coat both of hair and wool which enables them to bear the most intense cold without inconvenience there are differences of another kind no less remarkable as in size the length of their muzzles and the convexity of their foreheads but if we look for some of those essential changes which would be required to lend even the semblance of a foundation for the theory of Lamarck respecting the growth of new organs and the gradual obliteration of others we find nothing of the kind 4 in all these varieties of the dog says cuvier the relation of the bones within each other remains essentially the same the form of the teeth never changes in any perceptible degree except that in some individuals one additional false strider occasionally appears sometimes on the one side and sometimes on the other the greatest departure from a common type and it constitutes the maximum variation as yet known in the animal kingdom is exemplified in those races of dogs which have a supernumerary toe on the hind foot with the corresponding tarsal bones a variety analogous to one presented by six fingered families of the human race Lamarck has thrown out a conjecture that may have been the original of the dog and eminent naturalists are still divided in opinion on the subject it seems now admitted that both species agree in the period of gestation Mr. On has been unable to confirm the alleged differences in the structure of a part of the intestinal canal Mr. Bell inclines to the opinion that all the various races of dogs have descended from one common stock of which the wolf is the original source is well known that the horse, the ox, the boar and other domestic animals which have been introduced into South America and have won round in many parts have entirely lost all marks of domesticity and have reverted to the original characters of their species but dogs have also become wild in Cuba Haiti and in all the Caribbean islands in the course of the 17th century they hunted in packs from 12 to 50 or more in number and fearlessly attacked herds of wild wars and other animals it is natural therefore to declare to what form they reverted now they are said by many travelers to have assembled very nearly a shepherd's dog but it is certain that they were never turned into wolves they were extremely savage and the ravages appeared to have been as much dreaded as those of wolves but when any of their wolves were caught and brought from the wolves to the towns they grew up in the most perfect submission to man many examples might be adduced to prove that the extent to which the alteration of species can be pushed in the domestic state depends on the original capacity of the species to admit a variation the horse has been as long domesticated as the dog yet it's different races depart much less widely from a common type the ass has been still less changed the camel scarcely at all yet these species have probably been subjected to the influence of domestication as long as the horse end of chapter 34 part 1 chapter 34 part 2 of principles of geology this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org principles of geology by Charles Lyle mummies of animals in Egyptian tombs identical with species still living as the advocates of the theory of chance mutation just much to the slow and insensible changes which time may work they are accustomed to lament the absence of accurate descriptions and figures of particular animals and plants handed down from the earliest periods of history such as might have afforded data for comparing the condition of species at two periods considerably remote but fortunately we are in some measure independent of such evidence for by a singular accident the priests of Egypt have bequeathed to us in their cemeteries that information which museums and works of the Greek philosophers have failed to transmit for the careful investigation of these documents we are greatly indebted to the skill and diligence of those naturalists to accompany the French armies during their safe occupation of Egypt the conquest of four years from which we may date the improvement of the modern Egyptians and the arts and sciences and the rapid progress which has been made of late in our knowledge of the arts and sciences of their remote predecessors instead of wasting their whole time as so many preceding travelers had done and exclusively collecting human mummies Mr. Joffrey and his associates examined diligently and sent home great numbers of involved bodies of consecrated animals such as the bull, the dog the cat, the ape, the eukneum, the crocodile and the ibis to those who have ever been accustomed to connect the facts of natural history with philosophical speculations who have never raised their conceptions of the end and import of such studies beyond the mere admiration of isolated and beautiful objects with the exertion of scale and detecting specific differences it will seem incredible that amidst the day of arms and stirring excitement of political movements so much enthusiasm could have been felt in regards to these precious remains an official report drawn up by the professors of Museum at Paris on the value of these objects there are some eloquent passages which may appear extravagant unless we reflect how full these naturalists could appreciate the bearing of the facts that was brought to light on the past history of the globe it seems, say they as if the superstition of the ancient Egyptians had been inspired by nature with the view of transmitting to after ages a monument of her history that extraordinary and eccentric people by embalming with so much care at the brutes of their stupid adoration have left us in their secret grottoes, cabinets and zoology almost complete the climate has conspired with the art of embalming to preserve the bodies from corruption and we can now assure ourselves by our own eyes what was the state of a great number of species 3,000 years ago we can scarcely restrain the transports of our imagination on the holding that's preserved with their minutest bones with the smallest portions of their skin and in every particular one was perfectly recognizable many an animal which had thieved their manifest who were 3,000 years ago had its own priests and alters among the Egyptian mummies those procured were not only those of numerous wild crojapeds, birds, and reptiles but what was perhaps still higher importance in deciding the great question on a discussion they were the mummies of domestic animals among which those above mentioned the bull, the dog, and the cat were frequent now such was the conformity of the whole of these species to those now living that there was no more difference says Cougar between them between the human mummies and their embalmed bodies of men of the present day yet some of these animals have since that period been transported by men to almost every climate and forced to accommodate their habits to the greatest variety of circumstances the cat for example has been carried over the whole earth and within the last three centuries it has been naturalized in every part of the new world from the cold regions of Canada to the tropical plains of Guiana yet it has scarcely undergone any perceptible mutation and is still the same animal which was held sacred by the Egyptians of the ox undoubtedly there are many very distinct races but the bull apis which was led in solemn processions by the Egyptian priests did not differ from some of those now living the black cattle that have run wild in America where there were many peculiarities in the climate not to be found perhaps in any part of the old world and where scarcely a single plant on which they fed was of precisely the same species instead of altering their form and habits have actually reverted to the exact likeness of the original wild cattle of Europe in answer to the arguments drawn from the Egyptian mummies Lamarck said they were identical with their living descendants in the same country because the climate and physical geography of the banks of the Nile have remained unaltered for the last 30 centuries but why and maybe asked have other individuals of these species retain the same characters in many different corridors of the globe where the climate and many other conditions are so varied seeds and plants from the Egyptian tombs the evidence derived from the Egyptian monuments was not confined to the animal kingdom the fruits, seeds and other portions of 20 different plants were faithfully preserved in the same manner and among these the common wheat was procured by Delisle from closed vessels in the sepulchres of the kings the grain of which retained not only their form but even their color so effectual has proved the process of embalming with vitamin in a dry and equitable climate no difference could be detected between this wheat and that which now grows in the east and elsewhere in regard to the barley, I am informed by Mr. Brown the celebrated botanist that its identity with the grain of our own times can be tested by the closest comparison on examining, for example one of the seeds from Mr. Sam's Egyptian collection in the British Museum it is found that the structure of the husks or that part of the flower which is persistent agrees precisely with the barley of the present day and having one perfect flower and the filiform rudiments of a second some naturalists believe that the perfect identification of the ancient Egyptians in Syria with the varieties now cultivated has been carried still further by sowing the seeds taken out of the catacombs and raising plants from them but we want more evidence of this fact certain it is that when the experiment was recently made in the botanic garden at Q with 100 seeds of wheat, barley and lentils from the Egyptian collection before mentioned of the British Museum not one of them would germinate native country of the common wheat and here I may observe that there is an obvious answer to Lamarck's objection that the botanists cannot point out a country where the common wheat grows wild unless in places where it may have been derived from neighboring cultivation all naturalists are well aware the geographical distribution of a great number of species is extremely limited that it was to be expected that every useful plant should first be cultivated successfully in the country where it was indigenous and that probably every station which it partially occupied when growing wild would be selected by the agriculturalist as best suited to it when it artificially increased Palestine has been conjectured by a late writer on the Surilia to have been the original habitation of wheat and barley a supposition which is rendered more plausible by Hebrew and Egyptian traditions and by tracing the migrations of the worship of Ceres as indicative of the migrations of the plant if we are to infer that someone of the wild grasses has been transformed into the common wheat and that some animal of the genus Canis still unreclaimed has been metamorphosed into the dog because we cannot find the domestic dog or the cultivated wheat in a state of nature you may be next called upon to make similar admissions in regard to the camel for it seems very doubtful whether any race of the species of quadruped is now wild changes in plants produced by cultivation but if agriculture it will be said does not supply examples of extraordinary changes of form and organization the horticulturalist can at least appeal to facts which may confound the preceding train of reasoning the crab has been transformed into the apple the slow into the plum flowers have changed their color and become double and these two characters can be perpetuated by seed a bitter plant with baby sea green leaves has been taken from the seaside where it grew like wild charlotte and has been transplanted into the garden lost its saltiness and has been metamorphosed into two distinct vegetables some like each other as is each to the parent plant the red cabbage and the cauliflower these and the multitude of analogous facts are undoubtedly among the wonders of nature we can test more strongly perhaps the extent to which species may be modified and any examples derived from the animal kingdom but in these cases we find that we soon reach certain limits beyond which we are unable to cause the individuals to send you from the same stock to vary while on the other hand it is easy to show these extraordinary varieties could seldom arise and can never be perpetuated in a wild state for many generations under any imaginable combination of accidents it may be regarded as extreme cases brought about by human interference on which indicate a capability of indefinite modification in the natural world the propagation of a plant by buds or grafts and by cuttings is obviously a mode as which nature does not employ and this multiplication as well as that produced by roots and layers seems to merely operate as an extension of the life of an individual and not as a reproduction of the species that just happens by seed while plants increased by grafts or layers pertain precisely to the peculiar qualities of the individual to which they owe their origin they have only a determinant existence in some cases longer and another shorter it seems now admitted by horticulturalists that none of our garden varieties of fruit are entitled to be considered as strictly permanent but that they wear out after a time and we are thus compelled to resort again to seeds in which case there is so decided the tendency in the ceilings to revert to the original type that our utmost skill is sometimes baffled in attempting to recover the desired variety varieties of the cabbage in places of cabbages of fort as was admitted an astonishing example of deviation from the common type we can scarcely conceive them to have originated much less to have lasted for several generations without the intervention of man it is only by strong manures that these varieties have been obtained and in poorer sorals they instantly degenerate if therefore we suppose in a state of nature the seed of the wild brassica oleracea to have been wafted from the seaside to some spot enriched by the dung of animals to have there become a cauliflower it would soon diffuse its seed to some comparatively sterile soils around and that offspring would relapse to the likeness of parent stock but if we go so far as to imagine the soil in the spot first occupied to be constantly manure by herds of wild animals so as to continue as rich of that of the garden still the variety could not be maintained because we know that each of these races is prone to fecundate others and gardeners are compelled to exert the utmost diligence to prevent crossbreeds and to make sure the pollen of varieties growing in the poorer soil around would soon destroy the peculiar characters of the race which occupied the highly manure tract for if these accidents so continually happen in spite of our care among the culinary varieties it is easy to see how soon this cause might obliterate every marked singularity in a wild state besides it is well known that although the pampered races which we rear in our gardens for use or ornament may be often perpetuated by seed such abundance or so prolific in quality as well as individuals so that if the care of man were withdrawn most fertile variety would always in the end prevail over the more sterile similar remarks may be applied to the double flowers which present such strange anomalies to the botanist the ovarium in such cases is frequently abortive and the seeds when prolific are generally much fewer than where the flowers are single changes caused by soil some curious experiments recently made on the production of blue instead of red flowers and hydrangea hortensis illustrate the immediate effect of certain soils on the colors of the calyx and petals in garden mold or compost the flowers are invariably red and some kinds of bog earth they are blue and the same change is always produced by a particular sort of yellow loam varieties of the primrose Linnaeus was of opinion that the primrose ox lip, cow's lip and polyanthus were only varieties of the same species and botanists on the contrary consider them to be distinct although some concede that the ox lip might be a cross between the cow's lip and the primrose Mr. Herbert had lately recorded the following experiment I raised from the natural seed of one umbil of a highly manured red cow's lip a primrose a cow's lip, ox lip of the usual and other colors a black polyanthus a hose and hose cow's lip and the natural primrose bearing its flower on a polyanthus stalk from a seed of that very hose and hose cow's lip and hose primrose, I therefore consider all these to be only local varieties depending on soil and situation Professor Henslow of Cambridge has since confirmed this experiment to Mr. Herbert so that we have an example not only of the remarkable varieties which the flowers can obtain from a common stalk but of the distinctness of analogous races found in a wild state on what particular ingredient or quality in the earth these changes depend has not yet been ascertained but gardeners are well aware at the particular plants placed under the influence of certain circumstances are changed in various ways according to the species and as often as the experiments are repeated similar results are obtained the nature of these results however depends upon the species and they are therefore part of the specific character they exhibit the same phenomena again and again and indicate certain fixed and invariable relations between the physiological peculiarities of the plant and the influence of certain external agents they afford no ground for questioning the instability of species or rather the contrary they present this with a class of phenomena which when they are more thoroughly understood may afford some of the best tests for identifying species and proving that the attributes originally conferred endure so long as any issue of the original stalk remains upon the earth End of Chapter 34 Part 2 Chapter 35 of Principles of Geology This is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Principles of Geology by Charles Lyle Whether species have a real existence in nature continued Limits of the variability of species Species susceptible of modification may be altered greatly in a short time and in a few generations after which they remain stationary The animals now subject to man had originally an aptitude to domesticity Acquired peculiarities which become hereditary have a close connection with the habits or instincts of a species in a wild state Some qualities in certain animals have been conferred with the view of their relation to man Wild elephant domesticated in a few years but its faculty is incapable of further development The variability of a species compared to that of an individual I endeavored in the last chapter to show that a belief in the reality of species is not inconsistent with the idea of a considerable degree of variability in the specific character This opinion, indeed is little more than an extension of the idea which we must entertain of the identity of an individual throughout the changes which it is capable of undergoing If a quadruped inhabiting a cold nirgon latitude and covered with the warm coat of hair or wool be transported to a southern climate, he will often in the course of a few years shed a considerable portion of his coat which it gradually recovers on being again restored to a state of country Even there the same changes are perhaps super induced to a certain extent by the return of winter and summer We know that the alpine hair and the ermine or stout become white during winter and again obtain their full color during the warmer season and that the plumage of a ptarmigan undergoes like metamorphosis and color and quantity and that the change is equally temporary We are aware that if we reclaim some wild animal and modify its habits and instincts by domestication, it may if it escapes become in a few years nearly as wild and untractable as ever if the same individual be again retaken it may be reduced to its former tame state A plant is sown in a paired soil and nor that the petals of its flowers may multiply and their color be heightened or changed If we then withhold our care the flowers of the same species become again single and these and innumerable other instances you must suppose that the species was reduced with a certain number of qualities and in the case of animals with a variety of instincts some of which may or may not be developed or in the circumstances or which after having been called forth they again become latent when the exciting causes are removed Now, the formation of races seems the necessary consequence of such a capability in species to vary if it be a general law that the offspring should very closely resemble the parent but before we can infer that there are no limits to the deviation from an original type which may be brought about in the course of an indefinite number of generations we are to have some proof that in each successive generation individuals may go on acquiring an equal amount of peculiarities under the influence of equal changes or circumstances the balance of evidence however inclines most decidedly on the opposite side where in all cases we find that the quantity of diversions diminishes after a few generations in a very rapid ratio species susceptible modification may be greatly altered in a few generations it can be objected that it is out of our power to go on varying the circumstances in the same manner as might happen in the natural course of events during some great geological cycle for in the first place where a capacity is given to individuals to adapt themselves to new circumstances it does not generally require a very long period for its development if indeed such were the case it is not easy to see how the modifications would answer the ends proposed for all the individuals would die before new qualities habits or instincts were conferred when we have succeeded in naturalizing some tropical plant in a temperate climate nothing prevents us from attempting gradually to extend its distribution to higher latitudes or to greater elevations above the level of the sea allowing equal quantities of time or an equal number of generations for habituating the species to successive increments of cold but every husband and gardener is aware that such experiments will fail we are more likely to succeed in making some plants in the course of the first two generations support a considerable degree of difference of temperature than a very small difference afterwards that we persevere for many centuries it is the same if we take any other cause instead of temperature such as the quality of the food or the kind of dangers to which an animal is exposed or the soil in which a plant lives the alteration in habits form or organization is often rapid during a short period when the circumstances are made to vary farther though an ever so slight of degree on modification ceases and the individual perishes thus some herbivorous quadrupeds may be made to feed partially on fish or flesh but even these can never be taught to live on some herbs which they reject and which could poison them although the same may be very nutritious to other species of the same natural order so when man uses force or stratagem against wild animals the persecuted race soon becomes more cautious, watchful and cunning new instincts seem often to be developed and to become hereditary in the first two or three generations but let the skill and address of man increase however gradually no farther variation can take place no new qualities are elicited by the increasing dangers the alteration of the habits of the species has reached a point beyond which no ulterior modification is possible however indefinite the lapse of ages during which the new circumstances operate extirpation then follows rather than such a transformation as could alone enable the species to perpetuate itself under the new state of things animals no subject to man had originally an aptitude to domesticity it has been well observed by M.F.Cuvier and M.Duro de la Marre that unless some animals had manifested in a wild state an aptitude to second the efforts of man through domestication would never have been attempted they had all resembled the wolf the fox and the hyena the patients and the experimentalist would have been exhausted by innumerable failures before he at last succeeded in obtaining some imperfect results so if the first advantages derived from the cultivation of plants would have been elicited by a tedious and costly a process that is by which we now make some slight additional improvements in certain races we should remain to this day in ignorance of the greater number of their useful qualities acquired instincts of some animals become hereditary it is undoubtedly true that many new habits and qualities have not only been acquired of recent times by certain races of dogs but have been transferred into their offspring but in these cases it will be observed that the new peculiarities have an intimate relation to the habits of the animal in a wild state and therefore do not attest any tendency to a departure to an indefinite extent from the original type of species a race of dogs employed for hunting deer in the platform of Santa Fe in Mexico affords a beautiful illustration of a new hereditary instinct the mode of attack observes emeraldine which they employ consists in seizing the animal by the belly and overturning it in a sudden effort taking advantage of the moment when the body of this deer rests upon only the four legs the weight of the animal both thrown over is often six times that of its antagonist a dog of pure breed is positioned to this kind of chase and never attacks a deer from before while running even should the deer not perceiving him come directly upon him the dog steps aside and makes his assault on the flank whereas other hunting dogs though of superior strength and general sagacity which are brought from Europe are destitute of this instinct for a want of similar precautions they are often killed by the deer on the spot the vertebrae of their neck being dislocated by the violence of a shock a new instinct has also begun hereditary and a mongrel race of dogs employed by the inhabitants of the banks the Magdalena almost exclusively in hunting the white-lipped Picari the address of this dog consists in restraining their ardor and attaching themselves to no animal in particular but keeping the whole herd in check now among these dogs some are found which the very first time they are taken to the woods are acquainted with this mode of attack the dog of another breed starts forward at once is surrounded by the Picari and whenever may be his strength is destroyed in a moment some of our countrymen engaged of late in conducting one of the principal mining associations in Mexico that have Rial de Monte carried out with them in some English grey hounds of the best breed to hunt the hairs which are found in that country the great platform which is the scene of sport is at an elevation of about 9000 feet above the level of the sea 3 in the barometer stands habitually at the height of about 19 inches it was found the grey hounds could not support the fatigue of a long chase in this attenuated atmosphere and poor they could come up with their prey they lay down casting for breath but these same animals have produced welfs which have grown up and are not in the least degree incommodated by the want of density in the air but run down the hairs which is much each as a flutus of their race in this country the fixed and deliberate stand of the pointer has with propriety been regarded as a mere modification of a habit which may have been useful to wild race accustomed to win game and steal upon it by surprise first pausing for an instant in order to spring with unerring aim the faculty of the retriever however may justly be regarded as more inexplicable less easily referable to the instinctive passions of the species in Mahindya says a French writer in a recently published memoir having learned that there is a race of dogs in England which stopped and brought back game of their own accord procured a pair and having obtained a wealth from them kept it constantly under his eyes until he had an opportunity of assuring himself that without having received any instruction and on the very first day that it was scary to the chase he brought back game with as much steadiness as dogs which had been schooled into the same maneuver by means of the whip and collar attributes of animals and their relation to man such attainments as well as the habits and disposition which the shepherd's dog and many others inherit seems to be of a nature and extent which we can hardly explain by supposing them to be modifications of instincts necessary for the preservation of the species in a wild state when such remarkable habits appear in races of the species who may reasonably conjecture they were given with no other view than for the use of man and the preservation of the dog which thus obtains protection as a general rule I fully agree with M.F.Cuvier that in studying the habits of animals we must attempt as far as possible to refer their domestic qualities to modifications of instincts which are implanted in them in a state of nature and that writer has successfully been pointed out an admirable essay on the domestication of the mammalia the true origin of many dispositions which are vulgarly attributed to the influence of education alone but we should go too far if we did not admit that some of the qualities of particular animals and plants may have been given solely with a view to the connection which it was foreseen would exist between them and man especially when we see that connection to be in many cases so intimate at the greater number and sometimes as in the case of the camel all the individuals of the species which exist on earth are unsubjugation to the human race all the individuals of the species which exist on the earth are unsubjection to the human race we can perceive in the multitude of animals especially in some of the parasitic tribes that certain instincts and organs are conferred for the purpose of defense or attack against some other species now if we are reluctant to suppose that the existence of similar relations between man and the instincts of many of the inferior animals would adopt an hypothesis no less violent so in the opposite extreme to that which has led some to imagine the whole animate and inanimate creation has been solely for the support, gratification and instruction of mankind many species most hostile to our persons or property multiply in spite of our efforts to repress them others on the contrary are intentionally augmented many hundred full in number by our exertions in such instances we must imagine the relative resources of man and of species friendly or inimical to him to have been prospectively calculated and adjusted to withhold the scent to this supposition would be to refuse what we must grant in respect to the economy of nature and every other part of the organic creation for the various species of contemporary plants and animals have obviously the relative forces nicely balanced and their respective tastes passions and instincts so contrived that they are all in perfect harmony with each other and no other manner could have happened that each species surrounded as it is dangerous should be enabled to maintain its ground for periods of considerable duration and the hostility of the individuals of some of our domestic species extending as it does to attainments foreign to the natural habits and faculties may perhaps have been conferred with a view to their association with man but the species should be thereby made to vary indefinitely we find that such habits are never transmissible by generation a pig has been trained to hunt and point game with great activity and steadiness and other learned individuals of the same species have been taught to spell but such fortuitous requirements never become hereditary for they have no relation whatever to the exectancies of the animal in a wild state and cannot therefore be developments of any instinctive prostitutes influence of domestication an animal of domesticity says M.F.Cubierre is not essentially in a different situation in regard to the feeling of restraint to itself this is society without constraint because without doubt it was a social animal and conformed itself to the will of man because it has a chief to which in a wild state it would have yielded obedience there is nothing in its new situation that is not conformable to its it is satisfying its wants by submission to a master and makes no sacrifice of its natural inclinations all the social animals when left to themselves and all the individuals of the same herd know each other are mutually attached and will not allow a strange individual to join them in a wild state moreover they obey some individuals which by its superiority has become the chief of the herd our domestic species had originally the sociability of disposition and no solitary species however easy it may be to tame it has yet afforded the true domestic races we merely therefore develop to our own advantage prosperities would propel the individuals of certain species to draw near to their fellows the sheep which we have reared is induced to follow us as it would be led to follow the flock among which it was brought up when individuals of gregarious species have been accustomed to one master it is he alone whom they acknowledge as their chief the only whom they obey the elephant allows himself to be directed only by the carnike whom he is adopted the dog itself reared in solitude this master manifests a hospital disposition towards all others and everybody knows how dangerous it is to be in the midst of a herd of cows in pastures that are little frequented when they have not their head the keeper who take care of them everything therefore tends to convince us that formerly men were only with regard to the domestic animals but those who are particularly charged with care of them still are namely members of the society which these animals form among themselves and that they are only distinguished in the general mass by the authority which they haven't enabled to assume from their superiority of intellect thus every social animal which recognizes man as a member and as the chief of its herd is a domestic animal it might even be said that from the moment when such an animal admits man as a member of its society it is domesticated as man could not enter into such society without becoming the chief of it the genius author whose observations I have here cited admits that the obedience which the individuals of many domestic species yielden differently to every person is without analogy in any state of things which could exist previously to their subjugation by man each troop of wild horses it is true has some scallion for its chief who draws after him all the individuals of which the herd is composed one of the domesticated horse has passed from hand to hand and has served several masters he becomes equally docile towards any person and is subjected to the whole human race it seems fair to presume that the capability in the instinct of the horse to be thus modified was given to enable the species to render greater services to man and perhaps the facility with which many other acquired characters become hereditary in various races of the horse may be applicable only on a likes opposition for example a pace to which the domestic races in some parts of spanish-america are explicitly trained has in the course of several generations become hereditary and is assumed by all the young colds before they are broken in it seems also reasonable to conclude that the power bestowed upon the horse the dog the ox the sheep cat and many species of domestic fowls of supporting almost every client was given expressly to enable them to follow man throughout all parts of the globe and in order that we might obtain their services and their protection if it be objected at the elephant which by the union of strength, intelligence and the facility can render the greatest services to mankind it is incapable of living in any but the warmest latitudes we may observe the quantity of vegetable food acquired by this project head but renderers maintenance in the temperate zones too costly and in the Arctic impossible among the changes super induced by man none appear at first sight more bargable than the perfect tanness of certain domestic races it is well known that at however early in age we obtain possession of the young of many unreclaimed races they will retain throughout life a considerable timidity and apprehensiveness danger whereas after one or two generations the descendants of the same stock will habitually place the most implicit confidence in man there is good reason however to suspect that such changes are not without analogy in a state of nature or to speak more correctly in situations where man has not interfered we learn from Mr. Darman that in the Galapagos archipelago placed directly under the equator and nearly 600 miles west of the American continent all the terrestrial birds as the finches, doves, hawks and others are so tame that they may be culled with a switch one day, says its author a mockingbird alighted on the edge of a picture which I held in my hand and began to quietly sip the water and allowed me to lift it with a vessel from the ground yet formally when the first Europeans landed and found no inhabitants in these islands the birds were even tamer than now already they are beginning to acquire that salutary dread of man which in countries long settled is natural even to young birds which have never received any injury so in the Falkland Islands both the birds and foxes are entirely without fear of man whereas in the adjoining mainland of South America many of the same species of birds are extremely wild for there they have for ages been persecuted by the natives Dr. Richardson informs us in his able history of the habits of North American mammals that in the retired parts of the mountains where the hunters had seldom penetrated there is no difficulty in approaching the ship which there exhibit the simplicity of the character so remarkable in the domestic species but where they have been often fired at they are exceedingly wild alarming the companions on the approach of danger by hissing noise and scale the rocks with a speed and agility that baffle pursuit it is probable therefore that as man in defusing himself of the globe has tamed many wild races so also he has made many tame races wild had some of the larger carnivorous beasts capable of scaling the rocks made their way into the North American mountains before our hunters a similar alteration in the instincts of the sheep would doubtless have been brought about wild elephants domesticated in a few years no animal affords a more striking illustration of the principle points which I have been endeavoring to establish than the elephant for in the first place wonderful sagacity with which he combinates himself to the society of men and the new habits which he contracts are not the result of time nor of modifications produced in the course of many generations these animals will breed in captivity as is now a certain in opposition to the vulgar opinion of many modern naturalists and in conformity to that of those Asians, alien and Colomela Giddid has always been the custom as the least expensive mode of attaining them to capture wild individuals in the forest usually when full grown and in a few years after they are taken sometimes it is said in the space of a few months their education is completed had the whole species been domesticated from an early period in the history of men like the camel their superior intelligence would doubtless have been attributed to their long and familiar intercourse with the lord of the creation we know that a few years is sufficient to bring about this wonderful change of habits and although the same individual may continue to receive tuition for essentially afterwards yet it makes no further progress in the general development of its faculties where it otherwise indeed the animal would soon deserve more than the poet's epithet of half reasoning from the authority of our countrymen employed on a late permise war it appears in corroboration of older accounts that when elephants are required to execute extraordinary tasks they be made to understand they will receive unusual rewards some favorite dainties shown to them in the hope of acquiring which the work is done and so perfectly does the nature of their contract appear to be understood at the breach of it on the part of the master is often intended with danger in this case the power has been given to the species to adapt their social instincts to new circumstances with surprising epithety the extent of this change is defined by strict and arbitrary limits there is no indication of a tendency to continue diversions from certain attributes with which the elephant was originally endued no ground would ever for anticipating that in thousands of centuries any material alteration could ever be affected although we confer from analogy is that some more useful and peculiar races might probably be formed if the experiment were fairly tried and that some individual characteristic now only casual and temporary might be perpetuated by a generation in all cases therefore where the domestic qualities exist in animals they seem to require no length in process for the development and they appear to have been wholly denied to some classes which from their strength and social disposition might have rendered great services to man as for example a greater part of the Quajimuna the orangutan indeed which for its resemblance informed to man and apparently for no other good reason has been assumed by Lamar to be the most perfectly inferior animals has been tamed by the savages of Borneo and made to clean lofty trees and to bring down the fruit but he is said to yield to his masters an unwilling obedience and to be held in subjection only by a severe discipline we know nothing of the faculties of this animal which can suggest the idea that it rivals the elephant in intelligence much less anything which can countenance the dreams of those who fancied that it might have been transported into the dominant race one of the baboons of Sumatra appears to be more docile and is frequently chained by the inhabitants to ascend trees for the purpose of gathering coconuts a service in which the animal is very expert he selects sister Stanford Raffles the ripe nuts with great judgment and pulls no more than he has ordered the capuchin a kakajao monkey gar according to Humboldt taught to ascend trees in the same manner and to throw down fruit on the banks of the lower Orinoco it is for the margians to explain how it happens that those same savages of Borneo have not themselves acquired by dint of longing for many generations with the power of planting trees the elongated arms of the orang or even the prehensile tails of some American monkeys instead of being reduced to the necessity of subjugating stubborn and untractable fruits we should naturally have anticipated that their wants would have excited them to efforts and that continued efforts would have given rise to new organs to the reacquisition of organs which in a manner irreconcilable with the principle of the progressive system have grown obsolete in tribes of men which have such constant aid of them recapitulation it follows then from the different facts which have been considered in this chapter that a short period of time is generally sufficient to affect nearly the whole change which an alteration of external circumstances can bring about in the habits of the species and that such capacity of accommodation to new circumstances is enjoyed in very different degrees by different species certain qualities appear to be bestowed exclusively with a view to the relations which are destined to exist between different species and among others between certain species and men but these latter are always so nearly connected with the original habits and prespencies of each species in a wild state that they imply no indefinite capacity of varying from the original type the acquired habits derived from human tuition are rarely transmitted to the offspring and when this happens it is almost universally the case with those merely which have some obvious connection with the attributes of the species when in a state of independence End of chapter 35