262 Ri BO TIGORLIS TT [ocroBER 1899 
maintain is that each specific centre for a character in the germ-cell 
is represented in the nervous system by a specific centre for controlling 
such a character, ae. that the specific centre in the germ-cell has 
developed into a specific nerve-centre in the central nervous system. 
It is only in this way that we can recognise the unity of the organism, 
and can understand the specific morphological characters of the 
organism. 
In conclusion, I would call attention to a passage in Prof. Jordan’s 
work, “Footnotes of Evolution,’ which expresses the position of 
Lamarckians as well as Neo-Darwinians. “The fitness by which 
organisms have been perpetuated is simply obedience or adaptation. 
Those which survive are fitted to the conditions of life. In other 
words, they are obedient to those conditions. Hence we may define 
the process as one of the survival of the obedient.” Now whilst, as I 
have said, the above expresses well the conclusion of the Lamarckians 
as well as the Darwinians, the different standpoints of the two- 
schools must not be overlooked. The Darwinian believes that obedi- 
ence is at first restricted to the few in which favourable variations 
occur, and gradually through the production of more and more of such 
variations to the many; whilst the Lamarckian, recognising that 
the power to be obedient is a general law of nature, sees the obedient 
as the many, the disobedient being the few abnormal ones. Hence 
the main difference between the two schools resolves itself into this: 
The Lamarckian sees a general law of obedience, the Darwinians a law 
of opposition leading to a forced obedience. 
If obedience is through natural selection operating on all char- 
acters, it is almost impossible to conceive that favourable variations 
as regards all characters can be present at the same time and in the 
same individual; if such should not be the case it must lead to the 
perpetuation of unfavourable variations as regards the unfavourable 
characters. Again, that the most favourable variations are weeded 
out through sexual intermingling is proved by this fact which is 
taking place constantly in all tropical countries. If the product of a 
black and a white person—a mulatto—with the favourable feature or 
character—the brown colour—intermarries with a white, and the 
descendants do the like, the favourable character—the brown colour— 
gradually disappears, until the descendants are indistinguishable from 
Europeans. Here the favourable character, which ought to have been 
preserved through natural selection, is gradually weeded out. 
BArBAbos, W. INDIEs, 
July 1899. 
