justly proud than of the wonderful improvements which are daily
taking place in all sorts of mechanical appliances"; and goes on to
say that, as the vegetable kingdom was developed from the mineral,
and as the animal kingdom supervened upon the vegetable, "so now, in
the last few ages, an entirely new kingdom has sprung up of which we
as yet have only seen what will one day be considered the
antediluvian types of the race." He then speaks of the minute
members which compose the beautiful and intelligent little animal
which we call the watch, and of how it has gradually been evolved
from the clumsy brass clocks of the thirteenth century. Then comes
the question: Who will be man's successor? To which the answer is:
We are ourselves creating our own successors. Man will become to the
machine what the horse and the dog are to man; the conclusion being
that machines are, or are becoming, animate.

In 1863 Butler's family published in his name 'A First Year in
Canterbury Settlement', which, as the preface states, was compiled
from his letters home, his journal and extracts from two papers
contributed to the 'Eagle'. These two papers had appeared in the
'Eagle' as three articles entitled "Our Emigrant" and signed
"Cellarius." The proof-sheets of the book went out to New Zealand
for correction and were sent back in the Colombo, which was as
unfortunate as the 'Burmah', for she was wrecked. The proofs,
however, were fished up, though so nearly washed out as to be almost
undecipherable. Butler would have been just as well pleased if they
had remained at the bottom of the Indian Ocean, for he never liked
the book and always spoke of it as being full of youthful
priggishness; but I think he was a little hard upon it. Years
afterwards, in one of his later books, after quoting two passages
from Mr. Grant Allen and pointing out why he considered the second to