considered here: Weatherwax (30) says of the theory: 
‘Its most obvious general weakness is that there is so 
much theory in proportion to the available facts. It is 
topheavy with assumptions of such character that if any 
one of them should be rejected the whole structure would 
fall.’? And in essentially the same words he reiterates 
(31): ‘‘Our principal criticism of this ingenious explana- 
tion is that it involves too much theory for the facts. It 
is top-heavy with premises so interdependent that the 
failure of any one of them will cause the whole structure 
to fall.” 
Whether or not the theory is top-heavy with unsup- 
ported premises is largely a matter of personal opinion, 
and each reader is entitled to his own. However, if 
Weatherwax’s statements were once true, they are cer- 
tainly less so today, for the theory now has much more 
evidence in its support than when it was first proposed 
or even when the objections quoted above were made. 
Furthermore, these objections have overlooked some of 
the significant evidence which was even then available. 
We are disturbed by the fact that the extensive biblio- 
graphy, which is a part of the joint chapter by Weather- 
wax and Randolph ina recent book (25), omits a number 
of significant papers. The omissions are especially unfor- 
tunate when the authors cite one paper (26) which they 
believe supports their conclusions and omit two others 
published in the same journal (21, 33) which are contrary 
to them. 
The statements with regard to the interdependence of 
our premises and the charge that “‘if one of them should 
be rejected, the whole structure would fall’” are simply 
without foundation. It should be obvious, and in an 
earlier publication (18) we have emphasized the fact, that 
the three parts of this theory, although providing an in- 
tegrated picture of the origin of corn, are, to a large ex- 
[ 832 | 
