84 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



get a black one ; you will hardly get a pure white one. But take 

 any one of that breed — I have carried the experiment sometimes 

 to the seventh, eight, and ninth generations, so that I have got 

 so many facts in that direction that I cannot from memory sin- 

 gle out the different cases. Suppose you take from this progsny, 

 derived from a white and black rabbit, a white female, or one 

 which is almost white, and copulate her with another white 

 rabbit, as much like her as possible, you see you come to the 

 first case I have presented, where the two parents are as near 

 like one another as can be ; but this white female being the 

 offspring of a white and a black rabbit, her progeny with another 

 white rabbit will contain some black ones, as unmistakably as 

 can be. That is, there will be a grandchild resembling the 

 grandfather. This is perhaps still more obvious and easily 

 observed among dogs. I have had this case : a shepherd bitch 

 covered by a bull dog. There was a variety of dogs among the 

 young. Now, from the connection of one of them, which was as 

 unlike either of the parents as possibly could be, with another 

 very much like the parent dog, there have come pups that 

 resembled the shepherd and the bull dog, in a striking manner ; 

 again, exhibiting the relation of the grandparents to the prog- 

 eny of their young. Here, then, is the first guide in reference 

 to breeding — that in order to know the character of the offspring, 

 we should know not only what is the character of the father and 

 mother, but also of the grandparents, as fully as possible. 



Then the next thing is, the influence that the first copulation 

 has. It is by no means a matter of indifference which is the 

 first male connected with a female. Unquestionably, that first 

 connection in a measure affects all the future progeny. That 

 is to say, a female that has once been impregnated by a male, 

 will show the effect of that first connection through life, it may 

 be ; but at all events, for so long a time that you cannot get over 

 this first impression. It therefore shows, what I have satisfied 

 myself to be the truth among other animals by numerous exper- 

 iments : that the act of fecundation is not an act which is lim- 

 ited in its effect, but that it is an act which atfects the whole 

 system — the sexual system especially, and in the sexual system, 

 the ovary, in such a manner that the production of eggs from 

 that ovary, to be impregnated hereafter, is so modified by the 

 first act, that later impregnations do not efface that first impres- 



