i865 1881] F. MULLER 359 



Thank you for telling me about the first-formed flower Letter 682 

 having additional petals, stamens, carpels, etc., for it is a 

 possible means of transition of form ; it seems also connected 

 with the fact on which I have insisted of peloric flowers being 

 so often terminal. As pelorisin l is strongly inherited (and 

 [I] have just got a curious case of this in a leguminous plant 

 from India), would it not be worth while to fertilise some of 

 your early flowers having additional organs with pollen from 

 a similar flower, and see whether you could not make a race 

 thus characterised ? Some of your Abutilons have germinated, 

 but I have been very unfortunate with most of your seed. 



You will remember having given me in a former letter 

 an account of a very curious popular belief in regard to the 

 subsequent progeny of asses, which have borne mules ; and 

 now I have another case almost exactly like that of Lord 

 Morton's mare, in which it is said the shape of the hoofs in 

 the subsequent progeny are affected. (Pangenesis will turn 

 out true some day !) 2 



A few months ago I received an interesting letter and 

 paper from your brother, who has taken up a new and good 

 line of investigation, viz., the adaptation in insects for the 

 fertilisation of flowers. 



The only scientific man I have seen for several months 

 is Kolliker, who came here \vith Giinther, and whom I liked 

 extremely. 



I am working away very hard at my book on man and on 

 sexual selection, but I do not suppose I shall go to press till 

 late in the autumn. 



To F. Miiller. Letter 683 



Down, Jan. 1st, 1874. 



No doubt I owe to your kindness two pamphlets 3 received 

 a few days ago, which have interested me in an extraordinary 



1 See Letters 588, 589. Also Variation under Domestication, Ed. n., 

 Vol. I., pp. 388-9 



2 See Animals and Plants, Ed. II., Vol. I., p. 435. For recent work 

 on telegony see Ewart's "Experimental Investigations on Telegony," Phil. 

 Trans. R. Soc., 1899. A good account of the subject is given in the 

 Quarterly Review, 1899, p. 404. See also Letter 275, Vol. I. 



3 This refers to F. Miiller's " Bestaubungsversuche an Abutilon- 

 Arten " in \hzjenaische Zeitschr., Vol. VII., which are thus referred to by 

 Darwin (Cross and Self Pert., pp. 305-6) : " Fritz Miiller has shown by his 



