296 THE ENTOMOLOGIST. 



In domestication, breeds may be said to be produced under 

 artificial conditions, but at the same time in accordance with 

 natural laws. Man employs, sometimes unwittingly, the very 

 means adopted by Nature herself. That is, he selects the 

 varieties best suited to his purpose to breed from, and when he 

 has once got what he requires he is careful to keep the breed free 

 from contamination, or, in other words, from crossing with any 

 other variety. There is, perhaps, little to incite the several 

 breeds to compete one with the other, as the}' are not dependent 

 upon tlieir own resources in procuring food, &c. Neither is 

 there much inducement to rivalry on the part of the males or 

 selection on that of the females, as their matrimonial affairs are 

 usually arranged for them. If the several breeds of pigeons, 

 sheep, and dogs had been produced under nature, the process of 

 development would have been carried on at a very much slower 

 rate than has been the case under domestication. A large 

 number of the varieties would have been eliminated, or perhaps 

 would not have been produced at all. Furthermore, in nature 

 certain influences would have been at work, checking that free 

 intercrossing which obtains so largely among the domestic breeds 

 when not regulated by the breeder. 



Returning to icai'us, bellarc/us and corydon, and considering 

 them as three races or tribes, I am inclined to think tliat the 

 greatest bar to the free intercrossing of these insects in places 

 where each is numerously represented, is the inherited pre- 

 dilection females of each tribe have for the males of their own 

 tribe {ante, p. 124). Although these three insects possess certain 

 external characters by which they may be specifically separated 

 for the purposes of classification, I cannot suppose that there are 

 important differences in their reproductive systems. If then a 

 female of either tribe should by chance forsake the traditions of 

 her sex in tliat tribe, and mate with a male of either of the other 

 tribes, such crossing would, according to my view, result in 

 mongrel offspring; that is the issue of what under domestication 

 are termed breeds, but which in nature rank as species, though 

 not pure species, as I have endeavoured to show. 



Mr. Tutt has seriously misunderstood the tenor of m}' 

 argument if he apprehends that I consider icarus to be the 

 primitive form of the group of L3'C8en8e treated in my notes. I 

 certainly have supposed icarus to be the dominant form of the 



