EDITOR'S TABLE. 



553 



CORRESPONDENCE. 



" WEISMANN'S CONCESSIONS." 

 Editor Popular Science Monthly : 



Dear Sir: In your issue of this month 

 is an article by Prof. Lester F. Ward en- 

 titled Weisniann's Concessions. In this Prof. 

 Ward endeavors to show that Prof. Weis- 

 mann has virtually acknowledged his own 

 hypothesis on the inheritance of acquired 

 characters to be untenable. But Prof. Ward's 

 reasoning is vitiated by a thread of error 

 that runs through the whole article, viz., the 

 assumption that, in showing that Weismann 

 concedes modification of the germ-plasm by 

 agencies outside itself, with consequent va- 

 riety in inheritance, he has shown that Weis- 

 mann concedes the " inheritance of acquired 

 characters" in the sense in which this ex- 

 pression is used by Weismann, Romanes, 

 Lankester, and most other biologists of note. 

 By the expression " inheritance of acquired 

 characters," as used by Weismann and Ro- 

 manes, is meant the acquirement de novo of 

 characters by the somatoplasm of an indi- 

 vidual (not characters that the somatoplasm 

 has acquired in consequence of a modifica- 

 tion of the germ-plasm) which, in some way, 

 so modify that individual's germ-plasm that 

 its descendants inherit the characters that it 

 originally acquired. This is obviously very 

 different from a modification of the germ- 

 plasm by agencies external to it, that causes 

 the development of new characters in the 

 individuals developed from this germ-plasm 



and in their descendants. This last is not 

 inconsistent with Weismann's theory of the 

 continuity of the germ-plasm, while the " in- 

 heritance of acquired characters " (in the 

 sense used by Weismann) is. Prof. Ward 

 also speaks of the Lamarckian law as if he 

 thought what is generally meant by " La- 

 marckianism " was different from " inherit- 

 ance of acquired characters " (in Weismann's 

 sense). He makes another obvious mistake 

 where he criticises Weismann's statement 

 on the inheritance of syphilis, and, if my 

 memory serves me, he makes a great deal 

 more out of his quotation from Romanes 

 than Prof. Romanes ever meant, or the con- 

 text of the words quoted justifies. 



Weismann, while one of the clearest rea- 

 soners among biologists, is at times a little 

 hard to understand on account of his style, 

 and I think if Prof. Ward will reread his 

 works he will see that he has not done Prof. 

 Weismann justice. 



I do not mean to pose as a supporter of 

 all Weismann's views, but he seems to me 

 to have a clearer conception of the problem 

 of inheritance of acquired characters and of 

 the nature of the proof necessary to solve it 

 than almost any other man. At the same 

 time there is hardly an author who is more 

 misquoted and misrepresented he is one of 

 Darwin's chief rivals in this respect. 



Yours very truly, F. R. Welsh. 



32S Chestnut Street, PniLADELrniA, 

 June 9, 1894. 



EDITOR'S TABLE. 



MAN AND WOMAN. 

 "TTT"HEN men and women come to 

 VV saying ungracious things of one 

 another in a kind of hostile rivalry, the 

 situation is not pleasant, and bodes no 

 good to the coming generation. The 

 evil may be a limited one, yet it is, as 

 far as it exists, a real one, and is already 

 embittering and unsettling a good many 

 lives. Well would it be, therefore, if 

 some one could come forward with an 

 eirenicon that would still the unnatural 

 jarring which is a decided feature of to- 

 day's civilization. 



It is the women today who are in 

 the main on tlie aggressive. In fiction 

 and essay they are employing their new- 

 found intellectual powers in demon- 

 strating how poor a creature is man. Ac- 

 cording to some, it would appear as if 

 man had been the great imposture of 

 the ages, and that a certain instinct of 

 preservation liad led him to deny culture 

 to woman, lest he should be found out, 

 and the bubble of liis reputation eter- 

 nally collapse. One recent writer, w^ho, 

 however, assumes a man's name, has it 

 that if Nature had not implanted a trou- 



