Origin of Species Variorum

→ being effected by 1859 1860 1861 1866

having been effected through 1869 1872

→ animal in the ordinary state, 1859 1860 1861 1866

ordinary animal, 1869 1872

→ of structure, this being 1859 1860 1861 1866

which were 1869 1872

→ which 1859 1860 1861 1866

and that these 1869 1872

→ structure which have become correlated to 1859 1860 1861 1866

inherited structure which are correlated with 1869 1872

it had been profitable to the community that a number should have been annually born capable of work, but incapable of procreation, I can see no

especial

very great

difficulty in this →being effected by natural selection. But I must pass over this preliminary difficulty. The great difficulty lies in the working ants differing widely from both the males and the fertile females in structure, as in the shape of the

thorax

thorax,

and in being destitute of wings and sometimes of eyes, and in instinct. As far as instinct alone is concerned, the

wonderful

prodigious

difference in this respect between the workers and the perfect females, would have been

far

....

better exemplified by the hive-bee. If a working ant or other neuter insect had been an →animal in the ordinary state, I should have unhesitatingly assumed that all its characters had been slowly acquired through natural selection; namely, by

individuals

individual

having been born with

~~some~~

some

slight profitable

modifications,

modification

→of structure, this being inherited by

the

its

offspring;

offspring,

→which again varied and

again were

were again

selected, and so

onwards.

on wards.

But with the working ant we have an insect differing greatly from its parents, yet absolutely

sterile,

sterile;

so that it could never have transmitted successively acquired modifications of structure or instinct to its progeny. It may well be asked how is it possible to reconcile this case with the theory of natural selection?

First, let it be remembered that we have innumerable instances, both in our domestic productions and in those in a state of nature, of all sorts of differences of →structure which have become correlated to certain ages, and

with

either sex. We have differences correlated not only

with

one sex, but

with

that short period

~~alone~~

alone

when the reproductive system is active, as in the nuptial plumage of many birds, and in the hooked jaws of the male salmon. We have even slight differences in the horns