d,
left untouched by the other hoofed quadrupeds of the country, would have
been of some advantage to the nascent giraffe. Nor must we overlook the
fact, that increased bulk would act as a protection against almost all
beasts of prey excepting the lion; and against this animal, its tall
neck--and the taller the better--would, as Mr. Chauncey Wright has
remarked, serve as a watch-tower. It is from this cause, as Sir S. Baker
remarks, that no animal is more difficult to stalk than the giraffe.
This animal also uses its long neck as a means of offence or defence,
by violently swinging its head armed with stump-like horns. The
preservation of each species can rarely be determined by any one
advantage, but by the union of all, great and small.

Mr. Mivart then asks (and this is his second objection), if natural
selection be so potent, and if high browsing be so great an advantage,
why has not any other hoofed quadruped acquired a long neck and lofty
stature, besides the giraffe, and, in a lesser degree, the camel,
guanaco and macrauchenia? Or, again, why has not any member of the
group acquired a long proboscis? With respect to South Africa, which was
formerly inhabited by numerous herds of the giraffe, the answer is not
difficult, and can best be given by an illustration. In every meadow
in England, in which trees grow, we see the lower branches trimmed or
planed to an exact level by the browsing of the horses or cattle; and
what advantage would it be, for instance, to sheep, if kept there, to
acquire slightly longer necks? In every district some one kind of animal
will almost certainly be able to browse higher than the others; and it
is almost equally certain that this one kind alone could have its neck
elongated for this purpose, through natural selection and the effects
of increased use. In South Africa the competition for browsing on the
higher branches of the acacias and other trees must be between giraffe
and giraffe, and not with the other ungulate animals.

Why, in other quarters of the world, various animals belonging to this
same order have not acquired either an elongated neck or a proboscis,
cannot be distinctly answered; but it is as unreasonable to expect a
distinct answer to such a question as why some event in the history of
mankind did not occur in one country while it did in another. We are
ignorant with respect to the conditions which determine the numbers and
range of each species, and we cannot even co