The Project Gutenberg ebook of Darwinism (1889), by Alfred Russel Wallace

breadth, and was said to be upwards of 40 miles in extent. In this tract

almost every tree was furnished with nests wherever the branches could

accommodate them. The pigeons made their first appearance there about

the 10th of April, and left it altogether with their young before the

25th of May. As soon as the young were fully grown and before they left

the nests, numerous parties of the inhabitants from all parts of the

adjacent country came with waggons, axes, beds, cooking utensils, many

of them accompanied by the greater part of their families, and encamped

for several days at this immense nursery. Several of them informed me

that the noise was so great as to terrify their horses, and that it was

difficult for one person to hear another without bawling in his ear. The

ground was strewed with broken limbs of trees, eggs, and young squab

pigeons, which had been precipitated from above, and on which herds of

hogs were fattening. Hawks, buzzards, and eagles were sailing about in

great numbers, and seizing the squabs from the nests at pleasure; while,

from 20 feet upwards to the top of the trees, the view through the woods

presented a perpetual tumult of crowding and fluttering multitudes of

pigeons, their wings roaring like thunder, mingled with the frequent

crash of falling timber; for now the axemen were at work cutting down

those trees that seemed most crowded with nests, and contrived to fell

them in such a manner, that in their descent they might bring down

several others; by which means the falling of one large tree sometimes

produced 200 squabs little inferior in size to the old birds, and almost

one heap of fat. On some single trees upwards of a hundred nests were

found, each containing one squab only; a circumstance in the history of

the bird not generally known to naturalists.[11] It was dangerous to

walk under these flying and fluttering millions, from the frequent fall

of large branches, broken down by the weight of the multitudes above,

and which in their descent often destroyed numbers of the birds

themselves; while the clothes of those engaged in traversing the woods

were completely covered with the excrements of the pigeons.

part of the community in that quarter, and were confirmed in part by

what I myself witnessed. I passed for several miles through this same

breeding-place, where every tree was spotted with nests, the remains of

those above described. In many instances I counted upwards of ninety

nests on a single tree; but the pigeons had abandoned this place for

another, 60 or 80 miles off, towards Green River, where they were said

at that time to be equally numerous. From the great numbers that were

constantly passing over our heads to or from that quarter, I had no

doubt of the truth of this statement. The mast had been chiefly consumed

in Kentucky; and the pigeons, every morning a little before sunrise, set

out for the Indiana territory, the nearest part of which was about sixty

miles distant. Many of these returned before ten o'clock, and the great

body generally appeared on their return a little after noon. I had left

the public road to visit the remains of the breeding-place near

Shelbyville, and was traversing the woods with my gun, on my way to

Frankfort, when about ten o'clock the pigeons which I had observed

flying the greater part of the morning northerly, began to return in

such immense numbers as I never before had witnessed. Coming to an

opening by the side of a creek, where I had a more uninterrupted view, I

was astonished at their appearance: they were flying with great

steadiness and rapidity, at a height beyond gunshot, in several strata

deep, and so close together that, could shot have reached them, one

discharge could not have failed to bring down several individuals. From

right to left, as far as the eye could reach, the breadth of this vast

procession extended, seeming everywhere equally crowded. Curious to

determine how long this appearance would continue, I took out my watch

to note the time, and sat down to observe them. It was then half-past

one; I sat for more than an hour, but instead of a diminution of this

prodigious procession, it seemed rather to increase, both in numbers and

rapidity; and anxious to reach Frankfort before night, I rose and went

on. About four o'clock in the afternoon I crossed Kentucky River, at the

town of Frankfort, at which time the living torrent above my head seemed

as numerous and as extensive as ever. Long after this I observed them in

large bodies that continued to pass for six or eight minutes, and these

again were followed by other detached bodies, all moving in the same

south-east direction, till after six o'clock in the evening. The great

breadth of front which this mighty multitude preserved would seem to

intimate a corresponding breadth of their breeding-place, which, by

several gentlemen who had lately passed through part of it, was stated

to me at several miles."
From these various observations, Wilson calculated that the number of

birds contained in the mass of pigeons which he saw on this occasion was

at least two thousand millions, while this was only one of many similar

aggregations known to exist in various parts of the United States. The

picture here given of these defenceless birds, and their still more

defenceless young, exposed to the attacks of numerous rapacious enemies,

brings vividly before us one of the phases of the unceasing struggle for

existence ever going on; but when we consider the slow rate of increase

of these birds, and the enormous population they are nevertheless able

to maintain, we must be convinced that in the case of the majority of

birds which multiply far more rapidly, and yet are never able to attain

such numbers, the struggle against their numerous enemies and against

the adverse forces of nature must be even more severe or more

continuous.

_Struggle for Life between, closely allied Animals and Plants often the

most severe._

between an animal or plant and its direct enemies, whether these enemies

are other animals which devour it, or the forces of nature which destroy

it. But there is another kind of struggle often going on at the same

time between closely related species, which almost always terminates in

the destruction of one of them. As an example of what is meant, Darwin

states that the recent increase of the missel-thrush in parts of

Scotland has caused the decrease of the song-thrush.[12] The black rat

(Mus rattus) was the common rat of Europe till, in the beginning of the

eighteenth century, the large brown rat (Mus decumanus) appeared on the

Lower Volga, and thence spread more or less rapidly till it overran all

Europe, and generally drove out the black rat, which in most parts is

now comparatively rare or quite extinct. This invading rat has now been

carried by commerce all over the world, and in New Zealand has

completely extirpated a native rat, which the Maoris allege they brought

with them from their home in the Pacific; and in the same country a

native fly is being supplanted by the European house-fly. In Russia the

small Asiatic cockroach has driven away a larger native species; and in

Australia the imported hive-bee is exterminating the small stingless

native bee.

that the allied species fill nearly the same place in the economy of

nature. They require nearly the same kind of food, are exposed to the

same enemies and the same dangers. Hence, if one has ever so slight an

advantage over the other in procuring food or in avoiding danger, in its

rapidity of multiplication or its tenacity of life, it will increase

more rapidly, and by that very fact will cause the other to decrease and

often become altogether extinct. In some cases, no doubt, there is

actual war between the two, the stronger killing the weaker; but this is

by no means necessary, and there may be cases in which the weaker

species, physically, may prevail, by its power of more rapid

multiplication, its better withstanding vicissitudes of climates, or its

greater cunning in escaping the attacks of the common enemies. The same

principle is seen at work in the fact that certain mountain varieties of

sheep will starve out other mountain varieties, so that the two cannot

be kept together. In plants the same thing occurs. If several distinct

varieties of wheat are sown together, and the mixed seed resown, some of

the varieties which best suit the soil and climate, or are naturally the

most fertile, will beat the others and so yield more seed, and will

consequently in a few years supplant the other varieties.

of animals or plants living together, but often in distinct though

adjacent districts where the conditions of life are somewhat different.

Thus we may find cowslips (Primula veris) growing in a meadow, and

primroses (P. vulgaris) in an adjoining wood, each in abundance, but not

often intermingled. And for the same reason the old turf of a pasture or

heath consists of a great variety of plants matted together, so much so

that in a patch little more than a yard square Mr. Darwin found twenty

distinct species, belonging to eighteen distinct genera and to eight

natural orders, thus showing their extreme diversity of organisation.

For the same reason a number of distinct grasses and clovers are sown in

order to make a good lawn instead of any one species; and the quantity

of hay produced has been found to be greater from a variety of very

distinct grasses than from any one species of grass.

the north-temperate and arctic regions we find extensive forests of

pines or of oaks. But these are, after all, exceptional, and

characterise those regions only where the climate is little favourable

to forest vegetation. In the tropical and all the warm temperate parts

of the earth, where there is a sufficient supply of moisture, the

forests present the same variety of species as does the turf of our old

pastures; and in the equatorial virgin forests there is so great a

variety of forms, and they are so thoroughly intermingled, that the

traveller often finds it difficult to discover a second specimen of any

particular species which he has noticed. Even the forests of the

temperate zones, in all favourable situations, exhibit a considerable

variety of trees of distinct genera and families, and it is only when we

approach the outskirts of forest vegetation, where either drought or

winds or the severity of the winter is adverse to the existence of most

trees, that we find extensive tracts monopolised by one or two species.

Even Canada has more than sixty different forest trees and the Eastern

United States a hundred and fifty; Europe is rather poor, containing

about eighty trees only; while the forests of Eastern Asia, Japan, and

Manchuria are exceedingly rich, about a hundred and seventy species

being already known. And in all these countries the trees grow

intermingled, so that in every extensive forest we have a considerable

variety, as may be seen in the few remnants of our primitive woods in

some parts of Epping Forest and the New Forest.

movements and power of concealment, it is not so readily observed. As

illustrations we may refer to the wolf, ranging over Europe and Northern

Asia, while the jackal inhabits Southern Asia and Northern Africa; the

tree-porcupines, of which there are two closely allied species, one

inhabiting the eastern, the other the western half of North America; the

common hare (Lepus timidus) in Central and Southern Europe, while all

Northern Europe is inhabited by the variable hare (Lepus variabilis);

the common jay (Garrulus glandarius) inhabiting all Europe, while

another species (Garrulus Brandti) is found all across Asia from the

Urals to Japan; and many species of birds in the Eastern United States

are replaced by closely allied species in the west. Of course there are

also numbers of closely related species in the same country, but it will

almost always be found that they frequent different stations and have

somewhat different habits, and so do not come into direct competition

with each other; just as closely allied plants may inhabit the same

districts, when one prefers meadows the other woods, one a chalky soil

the other sand, one a damp situation the other a dry one. With plants,

fixed as they are to the earth, we easily note these peculiarities of

station; but with wild animals, which we see only on rare occasions, it

requires close and long-continued observation to detect the

peculiarities in their mode of life which may prevent all direct

competition between closely allied species dwelling in the same area.

_The Ethical Aspect of the Struggle for Existence_.

may be fitly concluded by a few remarks on its ethical aspect. Now that

the war of nature is better known, it has been dwelt upon by many

writers as presenting so vast an amount of cruelty and pain as to be

revolting to our instincts of humanity, while it has proved a

stumbling-block in the way of those who would fain believe in an

all-wise and benevolent ruler of the universe. Thus, a brilliant writer

says: "Pain, grief, disease, and death, are these the inventions of a

loving God? That no animal shall rise to excellence except by being

fatal to the life of others, is this the law of a kind Creator? It is

useless to say that pain has its benevolence, that massacre has its

mercy. Why is it so ordained that bad should be the raw material of

good? Pain is not the less pain because it is useful; murder is not less

murder because it is conducive to development. Here is blood upon the

hand still, and all the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten it."[13]
Even so thoughtful a writer as Professor Huxley adopts similar views. In

a recent article on "The Struggle for Existence" he speaks of the

myriads of generations of herbivorous animals which "have been tormented

and devoured by carnivores"; of the carnivores and herbivores alike

"subject to all the miseries incidental to old age, disease, and

over-multiplication"; and of the "more or less enduring suffering,"

which is the meed of both vanquished and victor. And he concludes that,

since thousands of times a minute, were our ears sharp enough, we should

hear sighs and groans of pain like those heard by Dante at the gate of

hell, the world cannot be governed by what we call benevolence.[14]

exaggerated; that the supposed "torments" and "miseries" of animals have

little real existence, but are the reflection of the imagined sensations

of cultivated men and women in similar circumstances; and that the

amount of actual suffering caused by the struggle for existence among

animals is altogether insignificant. Let us, therefore, endeavour to

ascertain what are the real facts on which these tremendous accusations

are founded.

the pain we suffer in the anticipation of death--a pain far greater, in

most cases, than the reality. This leads, probably, to an almost

perpetual enjoyment of their lives; since their constant watchfulness

against danger, and even their actual flight from an enemy, will be the

enjoyable 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, are 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 sprang, and we both came to the

ground below together. Growling horribly close to my ear, he shook me as

a terrier-dog does 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 or

feeling of terror_, though I was quite conscious of all that was

happening. It was like what patients partially under the influence of

chloroform describe, who see 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."

is equally produced by any accident which causes a general shock to the

system. Mr. Whymper describes an accident to himself during one of his

preliminary explorations 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 declares that

while falling and feeling blow after blow, he neither lost consciousness

nor suffered pain, merely thinking, calmly, that a few more blows would

finish him. We have therefore a right to conclude, that when death

follows soon after any great shock it is as easy and painless a death as

possible; and this is certainly 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 a state of nature begins to seek after prey till driven to do

so by hunger. When an animal is caught, therefore, it is very soon

devoured, and thus the first shock is followed by an almost painless

death. Neither do those which die of cold or hunger suffer much. Cold is

generally severest at night and has a tendency to produce sleep and

painless extinction. Hunger, on the other hand, is hardly felt during

periods of excitement, and when food is scarce the excitement of seeking

for it is at its greatest. It is probable, also, that when hunger

presses, most animals will devour anything to stay their hunger, and

will die of gradual exhaustion and weakness not necessarily painful, if

they do not fall an earlier prey to some enemy or to cold.[15]

animals. As a rule they come into existence 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 commencement of the dry season in the

tropics. They grow vigorously, being supplied with abundance of food;

and when they reach maturity their lives are a continual round of

healthy excitement and exercise, alternating with complete repose. The

daily search for the daily food employs all their faculties and

exercises every organ of their bodies, 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 conclude that animals, as a rule,

enjoy all the happiness of which they are capable. And this normal state

of happiness is not alloyed, as with us, by long periods--whole lives

often--of poverty or ill-health, and of the unsatisfied longing for

pleasures which others enjoy but to which we cannot attain. Illness, and

what answers to poverty in animals--continued hunger--are quickly

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 mangled limbs is

painful, while the idea of the suffering implied by it is heartrending.

We have a horror of all violent and sudden death, because we think of

the life full of promise cut short, of hopes and expectations

unfulfilled, and of the grief of mourning relatives. But all this is

quite out of place in the case of animals, for whom a violent and a

sudden death is in every way the best. Thus the poet's picture of

"Nature red in tooth and claw

With ravine"

is a picture the evil of which is read into it by our imaginations, the

reality being made up of full and happy lives, usually terminated by the

quickest and least painful of deaths.
On the whole, then, we conclude that the popular idea of the struggle

for existence entailing misery and pain on the animal world is the very

reverse of the truth. What it really brings about, is, the maximum of

life and of the enjoyment of life with the minimum of suffering and

pain. Given the necessity of death and reproduction--and without these

there could have been no progressive development of the organic

world,--and it is difficult even to imagine a system by which a greater

balance of happiness could have been secured. And this view was

evidently that of Darwin himself, who thus concludes his chapter on the

struggle for existence: "When we reflect on this struggle, we may

console ourselves with the full belief that the war of nature is not

incessant, that no fear is felt, that death is generally prompt, and

that the vigorous, the healthy, and the happy survive and multiply."
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 4: _Géographic Botanique_, p. 798.]
[Footnote 5: _The Origin of Species_, p. 53.]
[Footnote 6: _The Earth as Modified by Human Action_, p. 51.]
[Footnote 7: _The Origin of Species_, p. 56.]
[Footnote 8: See _Nature_, vol. xxxi. p. 63.]
[Footnote 9: _A Visit to South America_, 1878; also _Nature_, vol. xxxi.

pp. 263-339.]

New Zealand and Australia. No less than seven millions of rabbit-skins