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made but without arriving at any definite conclusions. Nature 

 seems to have provided that the number of either sex produced, 

 shall be nearly equal, but by what means this result is attained, 

 has not been discovered. Some physiologists think the sex decided 

 by the influence of the sire, others think it due to the mother. Sir 

 Everard Home believed the ovum or germ, previous to impregna- 

 tion to be of no sex, but so formed as to be equally fitted to become 

 either male or female, and that it is the process of impregnation 

 which marks the sex and forms the generative organs ; that before 

 the fourth month the sex cannot be said to be confirmed, and that 

 it will prove male or female as' the tentency to the paternal or 

 maternal type may preponderate. 



Mr. T. A. Knight* was of opinion that the sex of progeny de- 

 pended upon the influence of the female parent. He says, "The 

 female parent's influence upon the sex of offspring in cows, and I 

 have reason to believe in the females of our other domestic animals, 

 is so strong, that it may, I think, be pronounced nearly positive." 

 He also says, "I have repeatedly proved that by dividing a herd 

 of thirty cows into three equal parts, I could calculate with confi- 

 dence upon a large majority of females from one part, of males from 

 another, and upon nearly an equal number of males and females 

 from the remainder. I have frequently endeavored to change the 

 habits by changing the male without success." He relates a case 

 as follows — "Two cows brought all female offspring, one fourteen 

 in fifteen years, and the other fifteen in sixteen years, though I 

 annually changed the bull. Both however produced one male each, 

 and that in the same year ; and I confidently expected, when the 

 one produced a male that the other would, as she did." 



M. Giron, after long continued observation and experiment, stated 

 with much confidence, that the general law upon this point was 

 that the sex of progeny would depend on the greater or less rela- 

 tive vigor of the individuals coupled. In many experiments pur- 

 posely made, he obtained from ewes more males tlian females by 

 coupling very strong rams with ewes either too young, or too aged, 

 or badly fed, and more females than males by a reverse choice in 

 the ewes and rams he put together. 



Mon. Martegoute, formerly Professor of Rural Economy, in a 

 late communication to the "Journal D'Agriculture Pratique," says 



* Philosophical Transactions, 1809. 



