Lectures delivered before the Young Men's Christian Association . way, tomeet this exigency. We may suppose that the larva retracts its head so far fromthe opening gnawedinto its burrow as tobe out of reach of thelips, teeth, or tongueof the Aye-aye. Onefinger, however, oneach hand of thatanimal has been or-dained to grow inlength, but not inthickness, with theother digits; it re-mains slender as aprobe, and is provi-ded at the end witha hook-like claw, the, doubtless,rapid insertion and delicate application of this digit, thegrub is seized and drawn out. For this delicate manoeuvrethe Ay
Lectures delivered before the Young Men's Christian Association . way, tomeet this exigency. We may suppose that the larva retracts its head so far fromthe opening gnawedinto its burrow as tobe out of reach of thelips, teeth, or tongueof the Aye-aye. Onefinger, however, oneach hand of thatanimal has been or-dained to grow inlength, but not inthickness, with theother digits; it re-mains slender as aprobe, and is provi-ded at the end witha hook-like claw, the, doubtless,rapid insertion and delicate application of this digit, thegrub is seized and drawn out. For this delicate manoeuvrethe Aye-aye needs a free command of its upper or fore limbs;and to give it that power, one of the digits of the hind footis so modified and directed, that it can be applied, thumb-wise, to the other toes, and the foot is made a prehensilehand. Hereby the body is steadied by the firm grasp ofthese hinder hands during all the operations of the head,jaws, teeth, and fore-paws, required for the discovery andcapture of the common and favourite food of the nocturnalanimal. HAND OR FORE-PAW OF A1E-ATK. IN HIS ANIMAL CREATION. 15 Thus we have not only obvious, direct, and perfect adap-tations of particular mechanical instruments to particularfunctions,—of feet to grasp, of teeth to erode, of a finger toprobe and to extract,—but we see a correlation of theseseveral modifications with each other, and with adaptivemodifications of the nervous system and sense organs; ofeyes, ^ to catch the least glimmer of light, and of ears todetect the feeblest grating of sound,—the whole determininga compound mechanism to the perfect performance of a par-ticular kind of work. Our captive Chiromys, however, found none of the insectsof this country which were ofiered to it at all suitable to itstastes. And, like the Ant-eater, it preferred another kindof food to starvation, , bread, eggs and honey in milk^with dates and bananas. A repudiator of the principle of final causes thereuponobjects to th
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