Chap. XIII. REVERSION. 19 



between two non-sitting breeds invariably recover tlieir lost 

 instinct, any more than that crossed fowls or pigeons invari- 

 ably recover the red or blue plumage of their prototypes. Thus 

 I raised several chickens from a Polish hen by a Spanish 

 cock, — breeds which do not incubate, — and none of the young 

 hens at first showed any tendency to sit ; but one of them — 

 the only one which was preserved — in the third year sat well 

 on her eggs and reared a brood of chickens. So that here we 

 have the reappearance with advancing age of a primitive 

 instinct, in the same manner as we have seen that the red 

 plumage of the Gallas hanldva is sometimes reacquired both 

 b}^ crossed and purely -bred fowls of various kinds as they 

 grow old. 



The parents of all our domesticated animals were of course 

 aboriginally wild in disposition ; and when a domesticated 

 species is crossed with a distinct species, whether this is a 

 domesticated or only a tamed animal, the hybrids are often 

 wild to such a degree, that the fact is intelligible only on the 

 principle that the cross has caused a partial return to a 

 primitive disposition. Thus, the Earl of Powis formerly im- 

 ported some thoroughly domesticated humped cattle from 

 India, and crossed them with English breeds, which belong to 

 a distinct species ; and his agent remarked to me, without 

 any question having been a«ked, how oddly wild the cross- 

 bred animals were. The European wild boar and the Chinese 

 domesticated pig are almost certainly specifically distinct: 

 Sir F. Darwin crossed a sow of the latter breed with a wild 

 Alpine boar which had become extremely tame, but the young, 

 though having half-domesticated blood in their veins, were 

 *' extremely wild in confinement, and would not eat swill like 

 common English pigs." Captain Hutton, in India, crossed a 

 tame goat with a wild one from the Himalaya, and he re- 

 marked to me how surprisingly wild the oifspring were. 

 Mr. Hewitt, who has had great experience in crossing tame 

 cock-pheasants with fowls belonging to five breeds, gives as 

 the character of all " extraordinary wildness ;"'^^ but I have 

 myself seen one exception to this rule. Mr. S. J. Salter,*^ 



« 'The Poultry Book,' by Teget- " ' Natural Ili.-.toiy lievicw,' 1863. 



meier, 1866, pp. 165, 167. A]>ril, p. 277. 



