otective mimicry equally difficult or rather impossible to
account for by "Natural Selection." Again the difficulty as to the heads of
flat-fishes has been insisted on, as also the origin, and at the same time
the constancy, of the limbs of the highest animals. Reference has also been
made to the whalebone of whales, and to the impossibility of {61}
understanding its origin through "Natural Selection" only; the same as
regards the infant kangaroo, with its singular deficiency of power
compensated for by maternal structures on the one hand, to which its own
breathing organs bear direct relation on the other. Again, the delicate and
complex pedicellariae of Echinoderms, with a certain process of development
(through a secondary larva) found in that class, together with certain
other exceptional modes of development, have been brought forward. The
development of colour in certain apes, the hood of the cobra, and the
rattle of the rattlesnake have also been cited. Again, difficulties as to
the process of formation of the eye and ear, and as to the fully developed
condition of those complex organs, as well as of the voice, have been
considered. The beauty of certain shell-fish; the wonderful adaptations of
structure, and variety of form and resemblance, found in orchids; together
with the complex habits and social conditions of certain ants, have been
hastily passed in review. When all these complications are duly weighed and
considered, and when it is borne in mind how necessary it is for the
permanence of a new variety that many individuals in each case should be
simultaneously modified, the cumulative argument seems irresistible.

The Author of this book can say that though by no means disposed originally
to dissent from the theory of "Natural Selection," if only its difficulties
could be solved, he has found each successive year that deeper
consideration and more careful examination have more and more brought home
to him the inadequacy of Mr. Darwin's theory to account for the
preservation and intensification of incipient, specific, and generic
characters. That minute, fortuitous, and indefinite variations could have
brought about such special forms and modifications as have been enumerated
in this chapter, seems to contradict not imagination, but reason. [Page 62]

That either many individuals amongst a species of butterfly should be
simultaneously preserved through a similar accidental and minute variation
in