Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 36, Number 107, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 6 September 1904 — BATTLES OF NATURE. [ARTICLE]

BATTLES OF NATURE.

Unceasing Struggle* Which End la Survival of Fittest. We read the tablets of long ago which the geologist has deciphered for us, and we find them an endless story of battles. The successful species which occupy the great geological horizons have come out of great tribulation. The trilobites and stone lilies of the Silurian period, the gigantic club moss and fluted sigillarians of the coal age, the enormous ammonites of theJurassic and chalk epochs, the mighty elephants and majestip deer forms of the tertiary era are magnates of the times and masterpieces of the struggle. They have been redeemed at great price, even of a thousand species and tens of thousands of individuals who fell short of the typical fitness and were killed out. These magnates, each in Its turn, were pioneers of progress, like the scouts of a great army and were caught In a physiological ambush. The pedigree of the horse in the most recent past has been made out, traced shall we say, for a hundred thousand years before man came on the scene (for Lord Kelvin asked the geologist to hurry up and not be too lavish with time or we should have said 250,000 years before man). The fleetness, grace and strength of the horse are owing to his ability to walk on one toe, to which have been correlated the wonderful instincts by which he has become the partner of man in his Industries and struggles. He has been derived in almost a strict gradation from the two toed, three toed, four toed and five toed ancestors which flourished in the ages which preceded man. Myriads of Individuals and all the species and varieties died out to make room for the one toed selection to enable this favorite to occupy the ground unthwarted bycrossing or by recurrence to average forms. He was redeemed at a great price ahd has come through a great tribulation.—Contemporary Review.