| → born, 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869 |
| they are born, 1872 |
|
| → selection. If we admire the several ingenious contrivances, by which the flowers of the orchis and of many other plants are fertilised through insect agency, can we consider as equally perfect the elaboration by our fir-trees of dense clouds of pollen, in order that a few granules may be wafted by a chance breeze on to the ovules? 1860 |
| selection. 1859 1861 1866 1869 1872 |
|
| ↑ 2 blocks not present in 1860; present in 1859 1861 1866 1869 1872 |
| If we admire the several ingenious contrivances, by which the flowers of the
orchis
and of
many other plants are fertilised through insect agency, can we consider as equally perfect the elaboration by our fir-trees
of dense clouds of pollen,
in order
that a few granules may be wafted by a
chance breeze
on to the ovules? Summary
of
Chapter
.—
|
|
| ←Subtitle not present 1860
Summary
of
Chapter
.—
1859 1861 1866 1869 1872 |
| →
Summary of Chapter.
— We
1860 |
| We 1859 1861 1866 1869 1872 |
|
|
young
her
as soon as
→born,
or to perish herself in the combat; for undoubtedly this is for the good of the community; and maternal love or maternal hatred, though the latter fortunately is most rare, is all the same to the inexorable principle of natural
→selection. If we admire the several ingenious contrivances, by which the flowers of the orchis and of many other plants are fertilised through insect agency, can we consider as equally perfect the elaboration by our fir-trees of dense clouds of pollen, in order that a few granules may be wafted by a chance breeze on to the ovules?
↑
→
|
|
→
Summary of Chapter.
— We
have in this chapter discussed some of the difficulties and objections which may be urged against
theory. Many of them are
but I think that in the discussion light has been thrown on several facts, which on the
of independent acts of creation are utterly obscure. We have seen that species at any one period are not indefinitely variable, and are not linked together by a multitude of intermediate
partly because the process of natural selection
always
very slow, and
at any one
on a
few forms; and partly because the very process of natural selection
implies the continual supplanting and extinction of
and intermediate
Closely allied species, now living on a continuous area, must often have been formed when the area was not continuous, and when the conditions of life did not insensibly graduate away from one part to another. When two varieties are formed in two districts of a continuous area, an intermediate variety will often be formed, fitted for an intermediate zone; but from reasons assigned, the intermediate variety will usually exist in lesser numbers than
|
