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Show 116 DIFFICULTIES ON THEORY. [CHAP. yr. To give a few instances to illustrate these latter remarks. If green woodpeckers alone had existed, and we did not know that there were many black and pied kinds) I dare say that we should have thought that the green colour \vas a beautiful adaptation to hide this tree-frequenting bird from its enemies ; and consequently that it was a character of importance and might have been acquued through natural selection; as it is, I have no doubt that the colour is due to some quite distinct cause, probably to sexual selection. A trailing bamboo in the Malay Archipelago climbs the loftiest trees by the aid of exquisitely • constructed hooks clustered around the ends of the branch-es, and this contrivance, no doubt, is of the highest service to the plant ; but as we see nearly similar hooks on many trees which are not climbers, the hooks on the bamboo may have arisen from unknown laws of growth, and have been subsequently taken advantage of by the plant undergoing further modification and becoming a climber. The naked skin on the head of a vulture is generally looked at as a direct adaptation for wallowing in putridity ; and so it may be, or it may possibly be due to the direct action of putrid matter; but we should be very,cautious in drawing any such inference, when we see that the skin on the head of the clean-feeding male turkey is likewise naked. The sutures in the skulls of young mammals have been advanced as a beautiful adaptation for aiding parturition, and no doubt they facilitate, or may be indispensable for this act ; but as sutures occur in the skulls of young birds and reptiles, which have only to escape from a broken egg, we may infer that this structure has arisen from the laws of growth, and has been taken advantage of in the parturition of the higher animals. We are profoundly ignorant of the causes producing slight and unimportant variations ; and we are immediately made conscious of this by reflecting on the difference in the breeds of our domesticated animals in different countries,-more especially in the less civilized countries where there has been but little artificial selection. Careful observers are convinced that a damp climate affects the growth of the hair, and that with the hah• the horns OliAP. Vi.] ORGANS OF LITTLE IMPORTANCE. 177 are correlated. Mountain breeds always differ from lowland breeds ; and a mountainous country would probably affect the hind limbs from exercising them more, and possibly even the form of the pelvis; and then by the law of homologous variation, the front limbs and even the head ·would probably be affected. The shape, also, of the pelvis might affect by pressure the shape of the head of the youn$ in the womb. The laborious breathing necessary in h1gh regions would, we have some reason to believe, increase the size of the chest ; and again correlation would come into play. Animals kept by savages in different countries often have to struggle for their own subsistence, and would be exposed to a certain extent to natural selection, and individuals with slightly different constitutions would succeed best under different climates; and there is reason to believe that constitution and colour are correlated. A good observer, also, states that in cattle susceptibility to the attacks of flies is correlated with colour, as is the liability to be poisoned by certain plants; so that colour would be thus subjected to the action of natural selection. But we are far too ignorant to speculate on the relative importance of the several known and unknown laws of variation ; and I have here ·alluded to them only to show that, if we are unable to account for the characteristic differences of our domestic breeds, which nevertheless \Ve generally admit to have arisen through ordinary generation, we ought not to lay too much stress on our ignorance of the precise cause of the slight analogous differences between species. I might have adduced for this same purpose the differences between the races of man, which are so strongly marked; I may add that some little Ught can apparently be thrown on the origin of these differences, chiefly through sexual selection of a particular kind, but without here entering on copious details my reasoning would appear frivolous. The foregoing remarks lead me to say a few words on the protest lately made by some naturalists, against the utilitarian doctrine that every detail of structure has been produced for the good of its possessor. They believe that very many structures have been created for beauty in the 8* |
