Another book written by Jack London is called “The Seed of McCoy. ” This book talks about a two different crews of men sailing the sea. His story is mostly wrapped around this one crew of men on a boat called the Pyrenees that happens to have a cargo full of burning wheat. The men are seeking an island capable of anchoring them down so they can beach their boat. McCoy, who is the govern of the island of Pitcairn, was approached by this boat and it’s men to help them succeed in such a task. The second story he starts to talk about is about McCoy’s great-grandfather when he was out at sea a couple generations before.
In these times of difficulty, these men were tested to use their survival of the fittest and adaptation skills. Survival of the Fittest Summary of Pitcairn Pitcairn is an example of a community that almost collapsed. It all started back two generations before McCoy, when his great- grandfather and the rest of the Bounty crowd started to settle on Pitcairn. One of the men lost his wife and to deal with the loss, he took a Tahitian woman that happened to be a native man’s wife. In result of this un cooperative manner, a war began between the mutineers and the native men.
The whole war was a mess because there were people killing their own people, which was very un communal. Eventually all the native men were dead, and all of the white men except four. Survival of the fittest on Pitcairn Then awhile later, pretty much the same thing happened again. Quintal, who was one of the four men, his wife, fell to her death off of a cliff, so he demanded two men, Adams and Young, to give up their wives. “Adams and Young were afraid of Quintal. They knew he would kill them. So they killed him, the two of them together, with a hatchet (London 2015, p. 16).
The only way for the two of them to survive was to stand up for themselves and kill the reason why they may lose their lives, which was Quintal. Just like Buck in the story of The Call of The Wild, they had to kill or be killed. Survival of the Fittest on Pyrenees Captain Davenport and his men floating at sea on the Pyrenees were soon to be doomed if they did not do anything about their burning cargo. They managed to find their way to Pitcairn Island, only to hear McCoy say that there was nowhere on the island to beach their boat and that they should have gone another way.
They knew they wouldn’t be able to find anything on their own, and they needed someone who would be fit to navigate, so McCoy, who seemed quite credible, was then requested to join to assist them. These men could not have asked a better man to do so, because McCoy is a good example of someone who is fit to survive. McCoy’s Keys to Survival First of all, before McCoy decided to go out at sea, to potentially lose his life, as the chief magistrate of Pitcairn Island, he makes sure he has his community’s approval.
Because those bad men from generations before were not fit to survive on Pitcairn, they have been purposely selected out by the law of natural selection. So the current islanders were very cooperative with McCoy, and he left town without a fight. Secondly, McCoy had the softest voice imaginable, he is always calm and does not lose his temper no matter how stressful the situation might have been. When they were out at sea, attempting to locate the islands, they kept missing them. McCoy managed to stay positive and would say, “Well Captain, we may as well drive as burn.
Your decks are not going to hold out forever (London 2015, p. 8). ” And because was he is so calm, he could think more clearly to make more realistic decisions. Meanwhile, Captain Davenport would get very impatient, more so when he was stressed, he would lose his temper. Lastly, McCoy was very experienced and he always had an idea of where the upcoming islands were, eventually getting them to one and beaches it. Captain relies on the chart, but McCoy does not. “He did not refer to the chart. All these islands, reefs, shoals, lagoons, entrances, and distances were marked on the chart of his memory.
He knew them as the city dweller knows his buildings, streets, and alleys (London 2015, p. 10). ” Nothing is more reliable than your own experiences. Survival of Pitcairn and Pyrenees Pitcairn was lucky they did not collapse because they would fight over very insignificant things. The main reason why the Pitcairn community did not collapse was because there were people who knew how to be cooperative, making them some of the selected to survive. Then two generations later, these people who qualified for natural selection, had eventually created a bigger community of more people that would qualify.
The islanders have been raised from generations of survivors of the fittest, resulting in the newest generation to have those genetics and more. McCoy was able to help the crew in need to survive because he clearly shows what it takes to be fit for that environment. Adaptation Adaptation on Pitcairn and the Pyrenees The adaptation concept was not one of the largest concepts compared to survival of the fittest, but it still does apply when it comes to survival. Everywhere you go, you are constricted on adapting to your surroundings. On both Pitcairn Island and on the Pyrenees, the people were bound to adapt if they wanted to survive.
On Pitcairn Island, they had to adapt to the new groups of people they came with, the whites, natives and the Tahitian women. On the Pyrenees, the men had to adapt the the fact that they might not make it, but they will at least need to try. Adaptation on the Pyrenees McCoy and the crew were forced to adapt to the circumstances they were in. Even though McCoy had been on the boat longer than the rest, he adapted to it much better. They had to adapt to the fact that they might not make it, some took that idea a lot worse than others, like Captain Davenport, who was slowly losing both his mind and his hope.
He was found to have “an expression of musing hopelessness on his face (London 2015, p. 10). ” The key was to not give up. It may be hard because in this environment, when your boat is on fire, your crew is restless, and you have no idea where you are going to end up, if you even make it there, it can be hard not to give up. When McCoy stepped on board with his ability to adapt, his positiveness was able to calm everyone down with an almost hypnotic manner, and the rest seemed to adapt to him.
Behavioural Adaption Captain Davenport and the men began to adapt to McCoy’s calming presence because as a leader, he spoke with a calm, convincing tone, almost like everything will be alright. “Thee was no trouble. For that matter there had been no trouble averted. There never had been any trouble, for there was no place for such in the blissful world in which he lived (London, p. 15). ” As McCoy talked in that manner, the rest followed. They all became a lot less restless and a lot more composed. The men obeyed and started to work away, adapted to the new behaviour.
Adaption on Pitcairn I am sure that a bunch of men settling on an island that is very remote from a larger society would be hard, especially if your wife dies, but there is no need to demand another man to give up his wife. The obvious answer would be an angry “No! ” so don’t even bother. The men that attempted to steal alternative men’s wives did not survive because they just would not comprehend that no man will want to give that up. All they needed to do was grasp the fact that they need to adapt to the thought of not having a wife, because it will just cause conflict.
Conclusion of Seed of McCoy On both the island of Pitcairn and on the boat Pyrenees, survival of the fittest and adaptation were required to survive. On the Pitcairn Island, survival was a result if you knew how to cooperate with others in a realistic manner and adapt to their new surroundings because the men that had lost their lives dealt with it by stealing others, so Adams and Young had to fight for themselves. On the Pyrenees boat, survival was an outcome if you were fit for the job, not just physically, but mentally too. McCoy had experience because when he was younger and he would be away at sea a great deal, so he had lots of experience.
He was very mentally fit for this task, because he was very calm, and nothing made him hurry. “He thought smoothly and slowly, step by step, with the certitude of a mind that was never vexed or outraged by life (London 2015, p. 3). ” Therefore, there could not have been a better person to ask to guide your boat when at risk of killing you and all of your men. Conclusion After reading the two books of “The Call of the Wild” and “The Seed of McCoy,” the natural selection concept that Darwin had discovered had been very distinguished.
Natural selection played it’s role here clearly because the people who all died, were all living things that were weak and could not adapt to their changing surroundings, whether they were dog or human. After reading these two books, you can see how survival of the fittest and adaptation are very realistic and are happening everywhere. Survival of the fittest and ability to adapt was very prominent in the two books because you could see that the weak and unfit and the ones unable to adapt kept getting selected out and the fit and adapted would prosper.
The inexperienced American trio in The Call of the Wild and uncooperative men from Pitcairn island in The Seed of McCoy were all disqualified because they were very weak in cooperation and they would not accept their new surroundings leading to death from not cooperating. In the books, you could also see the ones who survived and you knew why they did. Buck and McCoy’s crew are two very good examples of survival because they were fit and they accepted their new surroundings and adapted to them.
Even though Buck was thrown into a completely new environment, he was able to survive because he was strong in the sense that he knew that in this environment, he had to adapt to the law of kill or be killed and he had to be strong to be able to live up to it. McCoy’s hypnotic voice is a most clear example of why he survived. I think we can all agree that we think the clearest when we are relaxed, so that made him fit. The ability to stay calm in very stressful settings can be very hard to accomplish, but he was able to adapt to the fact that the boat was burning and he may lose his life, but he stayed positive to keep everyone calm.
