"Still we are not positive that if neither destroyed by enemies nor famine they would increase too much; because for aught we known the fecundity is only great because the destruction is great; instead of the numbers being limited by the destruction, as if nature had said to the camivori, do what you will, you shall not reduce the number of animals, the more you kill the more I will produce. Were the experiment tried on a small scale of letting them be well fed and indulged they might produce prodigiously, but if the experiment extended to their whole races a different result might for aught we know obtain, as we are ignorant of the law by which nature governs the mode of production."