1897] ORIGIN OF SPECIES AMONG PLANTS 179 



general rule : first, to migration and isolation from the parent type, 

 with as much freedom from the struggle for existence as possible ; 

 secondly, to self-adaptation by the inherent power of response in 

 living protoplasm, excited by the physical influences of the new 

 environment. The result is for the most part new structures in 

 harmony with the new environment. If there be a thousand 

 seedlings of one and the same plant which germinate and grow 

 together, they will all put on, more or less, the same features under 

 the same definite action of the same surroundings ; though individual 

 differences will still be found among them as before. 



Conclusion. — Lastly, the answer to the question which heads 

 this paper is that natural selection plays no part in originating new 

 varieties, nor is it required as " means " or an aid in the origin of 

 species ; but is all-sufficient in the distribution of plants. 



Now the above conclusion is practically admitted by Dr 

 Wallace himself, in the following sentence : — " Should they [fixed 

 varieties of plants] be found to occur more frequently in other 

 countries [i.e., ' Representative plants,' which are indeed innumer- 

 able] as varieties of birds, mammals, and reptiles, &c, occur in 

 separate areas in North America — they may be usually 

 explained as adaptations to very different climatic condi- 

 tions, in which case the distinguishing characters will be 

 utilitarian [or otherwise] and the local varieties will be really 

 incipient species." The passage I have spaced represents pre- 

 cisely the views expressed in this paper. Darwin, too, admits the 

 possibility of the origin of species without the aid of natural selec- 

 tion. His words are as follows : — " By the term definite action, 1 

 mean an action of such a nature that, when many individuals of 

 the same variety are exposed during several generations to any 

 change in their physical conditions of life, all, or nearly all the 

 individuals are modified in the same manner. A new sub-variety 

 would thus be produced without the aid of natural selection." * 



Lastly, this was the conclusion of Mr Herbert Spencer, in 1852, 

 seven years before Darwin and Dr Wallace superadded natural 

 selection as an aid in the origin of species. He saw no necessity 

 for anything beyond the natural power of change with adaptation ; 

 and I venture now to add my own testimony, based upon upwards 

 of a quarter of a century's observations and experiments, which 

 have convinced me that Mr Spencer was right and Darwin was 

 wrong. His words are as follows : — " The supporters of the 

 development hypothesis can show . . . that any existing species, 

 animal or vegetable, when placed under conditions different from 

 its prervious ones, immediately begins to undergo certain changes of 

 structure fitting it for the new conditions . . . that in the 



1 "Animals and Plants under Domestication," vol. ii., p. 271. 



