SPECIES \'SD SUBSPECIES. 



229 



variations were sometimes observed in the size of tiie fiovvers and 

 leaves, and in the length of the pod and style, dependent on the 

 season and on the condition of the plants, but their distinctive 

 characters have, on the whole, remained constant, and at the time he 

 wrote, yonng plants of each of the ten species were growing in his 

 garden, and were all readily recognized by the leaves alone. Even 

 snch trifling deviations as these, from a fi^ed type, are, however, it 

 is evident, rare in his experience. 



In the case of annual plants, M. Jordan has, during a long 

 series of years, seen closely allied forms of Papaver, Erophila^ Viola, 

 Geranium, Erodium, &c., growing intermixed with each other in a 

 wild or naturalised state in his own neighbourhood, and invariably 

 coming up true from seed by hundreds and thousands, or sometimes, 

 tens of thousands. Each form, during the whole time, has retained its 

 special distinctive character, though all were under exactly the same 

 external conditions. TLiese forms, however closely allied, are there- 

 fore to him true unities, perfectly limited and distinct, constant and 

 invariable in their diU'erences, and completely irreducible one to 

 the other. In a word, they have all the characters of true species, 

 in the ordinary meaning of that word. To call them varieties 

 would, in his opinion, imply that they are now diiferent from what 

 they were created, a gratuitous and improbable hypothesis as much 

 opposed to facts as to reason. Even when the differences, though 

 quite definite, are too minute to attract the attention of ordinary 

 unskilled observers, or to be detected at the first glance, they are, 

 for our author, not the less of specific value. 



It is well to observe that by the phrase unskilled observers, we 

 are not to understand one who is entirely ignorant of natural science. 

 The term is meant to include every botanist, however learned and 

 experienced, who is without the special training necessary for the 

 appreciation of minute differences. We need scarcely say that no 

 one but M. Jordan will accept an induction based upon observations 

 continued during 25 years (or a less number), as an infallible proof 

 of invariability. It is evident that M. Jordan has approached the 

 investigation of the question, with preconceived ideas of the dura- 

 tion of the world and of the original mode of the creation of species, 

 which have given a bias to his modes of observation, and uncon- 

 sc iously led him into error. With the light which other observers 

 have, of late years, thrown upon the subject, it is more important to 

 notice that there is not in any part of the book before us the slightest 



