FOOTNOTES:
FOOTNOTES:
[1]“I use this term [struggle] in a large and metaphorical sense, including dependence of one being on another, and including success in leaving off spring.” (Darwin,Origin of Speciessixth London edition, page 59). This loose definition of the metaphor—which makes the baby playing with his toes a struggler because he depends on his mother, and which makes the guinea hen a better struggler than the eagle because one lays fifty eggs and the other only two—shows the absurdity of the whole struggle notion. All illustrations used by Darwin, such as the succession of forest trees, are of the same loosely-metaphorical kind. So long as English words have any meaning, there is no more “struggle” in the growth or death of forest trees than in waking to healthy life at the call of the sun or in going to sleep in the drowsy twilight.
[1]“I use this term [struggle] in a large and metaphorical sense, including dependence of one being on another, and including success in leaving off spring.” (Darwin,Origin of Speciessixth London edition, page 59). This loose definition of the metaphor—which makes the baby playing with his toes a struggler because he depends on his mother, and which makes the guinea hen a better struggler than the eagle because one lays fifty eggs and the other only two—shows the absurdity of the whole struggle notion. All illustrations used by Darwin, such as the succession of forest trees, are of the same loosely-metaphorical kind. So long as English words have any meaning, there is no more “struggle” in the growth or death of forest trees than in waking to healthy life at the call of the sun or in going to sleep in the drowsy twilight.
[2]The interior arrangements vary in different localities; but all beaver houses I have examined seem to be built on the same general plan. The following description is copied from a lodge of eight beavers which I laid open on the Mirimichi River, in New Brunswick. It was very clean, and a faint aroma of musk pervaded it three or four months after the animals had gone away. The description applies to other lodges I have opened, and is typical, I think, of all winter lodges in the north. A beaver’s summer house is more carelessly built, and the interior is a single large room, as described on page275.
[2]The interior arrangements vary in different localities; but all beaver houses I have examined seem to be built on the same general plan. The following description is copied from a lodge of eight beavers which I laid open on the Mirimichi River, in New Brunswick. It was very clean, and a faint aroma of musk pervaded it three or four months after the animals had gone away. The description applies to other lodges I have opened, and is typical, I think, of all winter lodges in the north. A beaver’s summer house is more carelessly built, and the interior is a single large room, as described on page275.
[3]For a description of the winter lodge, see page197-200.
[3]For a description of the winter lodge, see page197-200.