(Jeeves takes a notebook from his pocket, writes the word ‘Primate’ and becomes engrossed in a
word chain. After ten minutes Jeeves shows him the notebook, and he reads)
What is this?
‘PRIMATE PROMOTE PROMPTS PROSITS
PROSIER CROZIER WOOZIER WOOSTER’
From Primate to Wooster! By jingo, Jeeves, that’s clever!
Jeeves: Thank you, sir. Its’s a simple Darwinian statement:
Sense emerges, because species are functionally eloquent -
The evolutionary failures, the half-formed organs are conspicuously
Absent from seams - and by preserving the gist in harmony
With the broader movement of life I suggested Darwin’s
Idea of the plasticity of traits.¹ I’d have taken aeons
If I just rang changes - not airs, not Nature’s carillons! ²
Bertie: But Jeeves was a metaphysical directing force to the puzzle
Banishing blind chance, like Lamarck,³ Bergson, von Uexkűll!
Jeeves: I permuted the words, as if Nature could read. So arise
Double-barrelled mutations, by virtue of which stepwise
Though decimating the letters Nature uses - you ‘evolved’ from PRIMATE
In the Darwinian manner, gradual, progressive, seriate.
If the adaptive kernel is the interplay of countless genes,
Is the nut to be cracked by the mutant sledgehammer’s means?
Such drastic measures clash with progressive aesthetics,
Too hit-or-miss, and falling short of genetics.
Can a theory of trends stand on mutant ground?