Chap. XL SUMMARY OF THE CHAPTER. 437 



wliicli is well known to breed very true and never to show 

 any chesnut colour, — yet from this union the sow produced 

 some young pigs which were plainly marked with the same 

 chesnut tint as in the first litter. Similar cases have so 

 frequently occurred, that careful breeders avoid putting a 

 choice female of any animal to an inferior male, on account 

 of the injury to her subsequent progeny which may be 

 expected to follow. 



Some physiologists have attempted to account for these 

 remarkable results from a previous impregnation, by the 

 imagination of the mother having been strongly affected ; 

 but it will hereafter be seen that there are very slight grounds 

 for any such belief. Other physiologists attribute the result 

 to the close attachment and freely intercommunicating blood- 

 vessels between the modified embryo and mother. But the 

 analogy from the action of foreign pollen on the ovarium, seed- 

 coats, and other parts of the mother-plant, strongly supports 

 the belief that with animals the male element acts directly on 

 the female, and not through the crossed embryo. With 

 birds there is no close connection between the embryo and 

 mother ; yet a careful observer, Dr. Chapuis, states 153 that 

 with pigeons the influence of a first male sometimes makes 

 itself perceived in the succeeding broods ; but this statement 

 requires confirmation. 



Conclusion and Summary of the Chapter. — The facts given in 

 the latter half of this chapter are well worthy of consideration, 

 as they show us in how many extraordinary modes the union 

 of one form with another may lead to the modification of the 

 seminal offspring or of the buds, afterwards produced. 



There is nothing surprising in the offspring of species or 

 varieties crossed in the ordinary manner being modified ; but 

 the case of two plants within the same seed, which cohere 

 and differ from each other, is curious. When a bud is formed 

 after the cellular tissue of two species or two varieties have 

 been united, and it partakes of the characters of both 

 parents, the case is wonderful. But I need not here repeat 

 what has been so lately said on this subject. We have 



153 ' Le Pigeon Voyageur Beige,' 18G5, p. 59. 



