Progress in Study of Variations 125 



What changes have come about since Darwin's day 

 in regard to variations? 



" ( 1 ) We know that variations are even more abun- 

 dant than Darwin supposed ; the fountain of change 

 is copious. 



(2) We know, what Darwin did not clearly realize, 

 that novelties are due to permutations and combina- 

 tions in the germ-cells. The bodily novelties are the 

 expression of germinal changes. 



(3) Most of us are very dubious in regard to the 

 transmissibility of somatic modifications ("acquired 

 characters") as such or in any representative degree. 

 Though it is premature to shut the Lamarckian door, 

 there are few who would now say that the giraffe's 

 long neck is directly due to the efforts of its ancestors 

 to reach up to the leaves of the acacia trees, or that 

 the dwindling of our little toes is the nemesis of our 

 great-great-grandmothers' tight boots. 



(4) We know that discontinuous variations or 

 brusque mutations are much commoner than was pre- 

 viously supposed and that they have great staying 

 power in inheritance. A Greater Celandine with much 

 cut-up leaves — Chelidonium majus laciniatum — ap- 

 peared suddenly in an apothecary's garden in Heidel- 

 berg in the seventeenth century, and has bred true 

 ever since. Hornless calves, tail-less cats, lop-eared 

 rabbits, short-legged sheep, waltzing mice, copper 

 beeches, weeping willows, thornless prickly pears, 

 stoneless plums, and scores of other mutants are 

 familiar in the short period of precise observation; 



