240 NATURAL SCIENCE. Sept.. 1894. 



Natural Selection, like Inheritance of Acquired Characters, is a convenient working 

 hypothesis, and has still to be ^;sproved. 



The first part of Entomophilos's letter I do not follow. By the statement I 

 made I did not intend to imply more than a resemblance between our flora and those 

 of Northern Europe. It has been abundantly shown that the circle of visitors to a 

 given flower is of a very definite nature, and from the fact that in our fauna there 

 is a "natural preponderance of flies over other insects," it does not follow that 

 there will be a similar preponderance of flies among the insect-visitors of certain 



flowers. 



John C. Willis. 



Discussions at the British Association. 

 I WAS present at the discussion on Natural Selection in the Subsection of 

 Zoology, and feel strongly that the method adopted was not that most calculated to 

 lead to useful result. After a number of interesting objections to Natural Selection 

 had been urged, the most notable defenders of Darwinism contented themselves with 

 implying either that their adversaries did not understand what they were talking 

 about, or that they were unacquainted with the writings of Darwin. I wish to 

 support the judicial proposal of Sir Edward Fry, that these discussions should be 

 conducted like a case in a court of law, and that the counsel on either side should 

 be kept to the point at issue. I venture to suggest that, instead of lumping together 

 a somewhat heterogeneous set of papers, and then taking a discussion on the lot, it 

 would be well for the secretaries of the organising committees to settle beforehand 

 on definite subjects, or, better still, on definite propositions, and then to get 

 specialists to contribute arguments from their own knowledge on either side of the 

 case Gallic: 



Corrigendum. 

 C. H. B. WooDD, of Roslyn, Hampstead, calls our attention to an unfortunate 

 slip in the July number. Natural Science, vol. v., p. 16, 6th line from bottom 

 of page; for "were interchangeable terms, "read "were not interchangeable 

 terms." 



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