52 THE MENDEL JOURNAL 



sumption underlying all efforts at social reform 

 then what is the justification for them ? How, then, 

 do these two plants react to a changed environment, 

 when they are grown in the intenser sunlight that 

 shines on the mountain slopes at a height of 2,195 

 metres, instead of in the shadier valley ? What 

 justification, as living organisms, do they give us 

 for those almost frantic efforts which are designated 

 under the collective and misleading phrase, social 

 reform — efforts which ostensibly aim at improving 

 the environment of the weak and unfit on the as- 

 sumption that thereby they will be made strong 

 and fit ? No justification at all do we find in the 

 behaviour of any living organism. Nothing, in fact, 

 but condemnation of such efforts. For when these 

 two plants are moved from an old environment 

 common to them both, and are grown from seed and 

 reared under a new and identical environment, do 

 they both react in the same way to the same con- 

 ditions ? Not at all ! The Summer Savory changee 

 its colour, and becomes suffused over its whole 

 surface with a purple colouration. Careful examina- 

 tion of the tissues of the plant shows that this new 

 colour is developed in the most superficial tissues 

 only, the internal tissues remaining unchanged. 

 What is the meaning of this change of colour under 

 the new environment of an intenser sunlight ? 

 The purple-coloured sap which is thus called into 

 existence possesses the power of absorbing certain 

 of the rays of sunlight, and especially the particular 

 ones which are most active in the destruction of the 



