VARIATION UNDER DOMESTICATION 31 



one point do not differ at all in other points ; this is 

 hardly ever, perhaps never, the case. The laws of 

 correlation of growth, the importance of which should 

 never be overlooked, will ensure some differences ; but, 

 as a general rule, I cannot doubt that the continued 

 selection of slight variations, either in the leaves, the 

 flowers, or the fruit, will produce races differing from 

 each other chiefly in these characters. 



It may be objected that the principle of selection has 

 been reduced to methodical practice for scarcely more 

 than three-quarters of a century ; it has certainly been 

 more attended to of late years, and many treatises have 

 been published on the subject ; and the result has been, 

 in a corresponding degree, rapid and important. But 

 it is very far from true that the principle is a modern 

 discovery. I could give several references to the full 

 acknowledgment of the importance of the principle in 

 works of high antiquity. In rude and barbarous periods 

 of English history choice animals were often imported, 

 and laws were passed to prevent their exportation : the 

 destruction of horses under a certain size was ordered, 

 and this may be compared to the ' roguing ' of plants 

 by nurserymen. The principle of selection I find dis- 

 tinctly given in an ancient Chinese encyclopaedia. 

 Explicit rules are laid down by some of the Roman 

 classical writers. From passages in Genesis, it is clear 

 that the colour of domestic animals was at that early 

 period attended to. Savages now sometimes cross their 

 dogs with wild canine animals, to improve the breed, 

 and they formerly did so, as is attested by passages 

 in Pliny. The savages in South Africa match their 

 draught cattle by colour, as do some of the Esquimaux 

 their teams of dogs. Livingstone shows how much 

 good domestic breeds are valued by the negroes of 

 the interior of Africa who have not associated with 

 Europeans. Some of these facts do not show actual 

 selection, but they show that the breeding of domestic 

 animals was carefully attended to in ancient times, and 

 is now attended to by the lowest savages. It would, 

 indeed, have been a strange fact, had attention not 



