Jeff Ragan’s Reviews > Darwin > Status Update

"From the ardour of the male throughout the animal kingdom, he is generally willing to accept any female; and it is the female which usually exerts a choice" (429).

"With animals of all kinds, whenever colour has been modified for some special purpose, this has been, as far as we can judge, either for direct or indirect protection, or as an attraction between the sexes" (424).

"The two sexes of another lamellicorn beetle, the Ateuchus cicatricosus, live in pairs, and seem much attached to each other..." (417).

"...insects belonging to this order [Hymenoptera] have the power of recognising each other after long intervals of time, and are deeply attached" (412).

"Every one who has wandered in a tropical forest must have been astonished at the din made by the male Cicadae. The females are mute; as the Grecian poet Xenarchus says 'Happy the cicadas live, since they all have voiceless wives'" (407).

"[Snails]...permanent attachment...into a small...garden...the strong...individual disappeared, & was traced by its track...over a wall into an adjoining well-stocked garden. Mr. Lonsdale concluded that it had deserted its sickly mate; but after an absence of 24 hours it returned, &...communicated the result of its successful exploration, for both then started along the same track & disappeared over the wall" (396).

"In no case...would an inherited tendency to produce both sexes in equal numbers or to produce one sex in excess, be a direct advantage...to certain individuals...for instance, an individual with a tendency to produce more males than females would not succeed better in the battle for life than an individual with an opposite tendency...a tendency of this kind could not be gained through natural selection" (394).

"It seems at first sight a mysterious fact that in different nations, under different conditions and climates, in Naples, Prussia, Westphalia, Holland, France, England and the United States, the excess of male over female births is less when they are illegitimate than when legitimate...we have seen that male infants, from the large size of their heads, suffer more than female infants during parturition... (384)"

"...we may conclude that one, though not the sole cause of characters being exclusively inherited by one sex, is their development at a late age. And secondly, that one, though apparently a less efficient cause of characters being inherited by both sexes, is their development at an early age, whilst the sexes differ but little in constitution" (381).

"...the advantages which favoured males derive from conquering other males in battle or courtship, and thus leaving a numerous progeny, are in the long run greater than those derived from rather more perfect adaptation to their conditions of life" (374-5).