| → are our existing 1872 |
| our present 1859 1860 1861 |
| are our present 1866 1869 |
|
| → of a genus ever 1861 1866 1869 1872 |
| are 1859 1860 |
|
| → the other species becoming utterly extinct and leaving no modified progeny. 1861 1866 1869 1872 |
| at any one period; and all changes are slowly effected. 1859 1860 |
|
|
that we are as yet very ignorant
the full extent of the various climatal and geographical changes which have affected the earth during modern periods; and such changes
have
facilitated migration. As an example, I have attempted to show how potent has been the influence of the Glacial period on the distribution
of the same and of
species throughout the world. We are as yet profoundly ignorant of the many occasional means of transport. With respect to distinct species of the same genus inhabiting
distant and isolated regions, as the process of modification has necessarily been slow, all the means of migration will have been possible during a very long period; and consequently the difficulty of the wide diffusion of
of the same genus is in some degree lessened. |
|
| As
the theory of natural selection an interminable number of intermediate forms must have existed, linking together all the species in each group by
as fine as
→are our existing
varieties, it may be asked, Why do we not see these linking forms all around us? Why are not all organic beings blended together in an inextricable chaos? With respect to existing forms, we should remember that we have no right to expect (excepting in rare cases) to discover
directly
connecting links between them, but only between each and some extinct and supplanted form. Even on a wide area, which has during a long period remained continuous, and of which the
and other conditions of life change insensibly in
from a district occupied by one species into another district occupied by a closely allied species, we have no just right to expect often to find intermediate varieties in the intermediate
For we have reason to believe that only a few species
→of a genus ever
→the other species becoming utterly extinct and leaving no modified progeny. Of the species which do change, only a few within the same country change at the same time; and all modifications are slowly effected. I have also shown that the intermediate varieties which
at first
in the intermediate zones,
be liable to be supplanted by the allied forms on either hand;
the latter, from existing in greater numbers,
generally be modified and improved at a quicker rate than the intermediate varieties, which
in lesser numbers; so that the intermediate varieties
in the long run, be supplanted and exterminated. |
|
| On this doctrine of the extermination of an infinitude of connecting links, between the living and extinct inhabitants of the world, and at each successive period between the extinct and still
|
