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Show 38 DARWINISM CHAP. exercise of the powers and faculties they possess, unmixed with any serious dread. There is, in the next place, much evidence to show that violent deaths, if not too prolonged, arc painless and easy; even in the case of man, whose nervous system is in all probability much more susceptible to pain than that of most animals. In all cases in which persons have escaped after being seized by a lion or tiger, they declare that they suffered little or no pain, physical or mental. A well-known instance is that of Livingstone, who thus describes his sensations when seized by a lion : "Starting and looking half round, I saw the lion just in the act of springing on me. I was upon a little height; he caught my shoulder as he spmng, and we both came to the ground below together. Gro·wling horribly close to my car, he shook me as a terrier-dog docs a rat. The shock produced a stupor similar to that which seems to be felt by a mouse after the first shake of the cat. It causes a sort of dreaminess, in which there was no sense of pain 01· feeling of terror, though I was quite conscious of all that was happening. It was like what patients partiaJly under the influence of chloroform describe, who sec all the operation, but feel not the knife. This singular condition was not the result· of any mental process. The shake annihilated fear, and allowed no sense of horror in looking round at the beast." This absence of pain is not peculiar to those seized by wild beasts, but is equally produced by any accident which can cs a general shock to tho system. Mr. Whymper describes :m ::tecidont to himself during one of his preliminary explomtion:-; of the Matterhorn, when he fell several hundred feet, bounding from rock to rock, till fortunately embedded in a snow-drift near the edge of a tremendous precipice. He decbre:-; LlmL while falling and feeling blow after blow, he neither lost consciousness nor suffered pain, merely thinking, calmly, tlmt a few more blows would finish him. W c have therefore :L right to conclude, that when death follows soon after any gr~a~ shock .it is as easy and painless a death as possible ; and tlus 1s certamly what happens when an animal is seized by a beast of prey. For the enemy is one which hunts for food, not for pleasure or excitement; and it is doubtful whether any carnivorous animal in ~ state of nature begins to seck after 11 TilE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE 39 prey till driven to do so hy hnngcr. \Vhcn an animal is caught, therefore, it is very soon devoured, and thus tho first shock is followed by an almost painless death. Neither do those which die of cold or hunger suffer much. Cold is generally sc~crcst at .nig~t and has a tendency to produce sleep and pamlcss extmctwn. Hunger, on the other hand, is hardly felt during periods of excitement, and when foou is ~carcc the excitement of seeking for it is at its greatest. J t IS probable, also, that when hunger presses, most animals will devour ~nything to stay their hunger, and will die of gradual exhaustiOn am~ wcaJmcss not necessarily painfnl, if they do not fall an earher prey to some enemy or to cold.l Now let ns consider what arc tho enjoyments of the lives of most animals. A. a rule they como into cxi tcnco at a time of year when food is most plentiful and the climate most suitable, that is in the spring of the temperate zone and at the co~mencemcnt of the dry season in the tropics. . They grow vigorously, being supplied with abnnuancc of food; and when they reach maturity their lives nrc a, continual round of healthy excitement and exercise, alternating with complete repos~. The daily. search for the daily food employs all their facul~1cs and exercises every organ of their hodies, while this exercise leads to the satisfaction of all their physical needs. In our own case, we can give no more perfect definition of happiness, than this exercise and this satisfaction ; and we must. therefore c.onclude that animals, as a rule, enjoy all the happmess of whiCh they arc capable. And this normal state of happ~ncss is not alloyed, a. with us, by long periods-whole hvcs often-of poverty or ill-health, and of the unsatisfied longing for pleasures which other· enjoy bnt to which we. cn.nnot att.a,in. Illness, and what answers to poverty in ammals-contmued hunger-arc qnicldy followed by unanticipated and almost painless extinction. ·where we err is in giving to animals feelings and emotions which they do 'not possess. To us the very sight of blood and of torn or mancrled limbs is painful, while tho idea of the suffering implied b~ it 1 T~1e Kestrel, \~hich usually feeds on mice, hinlfl, and frogs, sometimes ~~ays 1ts hunger with eai:thworllls, as do some of the American uuzz:mls. 1 he Honey-buzzanl sometimes eats not only catth worms and slugs, bnt even corn; and the Bnteo borealis of North America whose usual foo<.l is Slllall mammals and birds, sometimes eats crayfish. ' |