taxes, finally found it was quite impossible to meet their engagements, and made every effort to leave the curia.1 2. The degeneration of Societies in all their parts. -A number of instances might be mentioned of general social degeneration bringing about the atrophy of some one or other institution in particular. Besides giving classical examples, such as the Romans, Peruvians and Astecs, V. Lilienfeld mentions the decline of the Negro kingdoms which existed during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Southern and Western Africa, and which are merely represented nowadays by wretched little tribes.2 There are, according to Waitz, at some distance from Carimango (the equatorial Republic) some people of pure Spanish blood who have fallen back into absolute barbarism. Their language is deformed past recognition, and their manners and customs exhibit no traces of their former condition.3 Space precludes us from dwelling further upon the various causes-often complex and obscure— which bring about the downfall of societies, suffice it to say that they are connected with 1 Lavisse and Rambeaud, Histoire générale, I., ch. i., pp. 14 and following. 2 Von Lilienfeld, Gedanke über de Sozialwissenschaft der Zukunft, ii., p. 241. 3 Waitz, Anthropologie der Naturvolker, 1. B., p. 369. territory or with population, the two factors of social evolution. Either the physical surroundings of institutions undergo unfavourable transformations, or else the population itself degenerates. (1) The almost complete disappearance of the great family communities (zadrugas) of Montenegro is a characteristic instance of atrophy from lack of resources caused by the impoverishment of physical surroundings. The persistent cutting down of trees in the Black Mountain has had a disastrous effect on the water supply, and consequently upon the fertility of the ground. Most of the zadrugas, having found it impossible to continue their existence in common upon the same territory, have split up into small families (inokosnas). These latter represent, in a reduced state, the old family system from which they have sprung. Bogisic has shown that these in no way resemble our modern families, but are to be regarded, from the judicial point of view, as reduced family communities, each comprised of only a few persons. (2) Other cases occur where the atrophy of an institution of an artistic or scientific society, for instance is brought about by the degeneration of a population which ceases to be interested in the society and no longer contributes to its support. A large number of cases of this kind might easily be mentioned, especially as occurring during the period of the Byzantine Empire, but it is difficult T to account for the sudden degeneration of a people where the physical surroundings had recently undergone no special modifications, and when there had been no sudden and violent check upon social development. According to Lapouge and other sociologists of the Darwinian school, this social degeneration was merely the outcome of hereditary influences. The destiny of a nation is dependent upon the quality of the elements of which it is composed and by which it is directed. If If a nation is rich in energetic and intelligent qualities, the greatest of disasters can only have a transitory and limited influence. When the contrary is the case, the same circumstances may produce an arrest in development or a complete decline and fall. Up to the present time, and especially in antiquity and the middle ages, these favourable qualities were generally supplied by a dominating minority establishing itself in a conquered country. In the common course of evolution, these superior elements, which are indispensable to social progress, are eventually eliminated. The inferior elements regain greater power, and each step of their progress is attended by a backward step towards barbarism. Although, at first sight, this seems contrary to the Darwinian theory, it is strictly in accordance with it. The superior individuals are relatively inferior when their chances of success or of posterity diminish. The superior individuals may not only be swamped by a diminution in their birth-rate, but in some cases there may be a direct elimination of them.1 The tendency of decadence is always towards the degenerative and eliminatory selection of superior elements. It may be said in conclusion that there are constant calls upon the capital and labour of a society from its various institutions, and the consequence is that, the resources not being unlimited, a regular struggle for existence goes on amongst the institutions. In the course of this struggle, the decline of an institution may be brought about in two different ways. It either begins to degenerate from lack of sufficient means of support, or degeneration sets in consequent upon the institution having ceased to be functional by inutility, by transference of function to another institution, or by obstacles placed in the way of exercising that function. In either case the institution disappears. It is only in exceptional cases, which will be alluded to further on, that existence is still maintained. 1 G. de Lapouge, La Vie et la Mort des nations (Révue int. de Sociologie, 1894, pp. 421 and following). Several terms used in this treatise were borrowed from the above article. 66 See also Hovelacque and Hervé, Précis d'Anthropologie, p. 189: War, in its double consequence of the elimination of the strong and the survival of the weak, is for the more civilized races a powerful factor in the cause of degeneration and downfall." PART II THE CAUSES OF THE PERSISTENCE OF ORGANS CHAPTER I SURVIVAL OF ORGANS We have shown how and why organs may become rudimentary and tend to disappear. In many cases the disappearance is complete; and the organ may not even reappear temporarily in the course of the individual development. This disappearance is, however, by no means universal. Even apart from the phenomena of recapitulation, rudimentary organs may persist in the adult, and sometimes, even although organs have ceased to be functional, they persist without degenerating. We have now to consider why in such cases degenerative evolution does not result in complete obliteration of such organs. § 1. Unfunctional organs that are not rudimentary. ABSENCE OF VARIATIONS.- -There are some plants such as Ficaria 1 ranunculoïdes and Lysimachia 1 Lysimachia Nummularia occasionally produce seeds in some valleys of the Pyrenees, and Errera has shown us specimens grown from seeds coming from the shores of the lake of Quatre-Cantons, |