COMBS OF FOWLS 191 



nature and amount of variation normally occurring in 

 a homogeneous pure-bred strain of Barred Plymouth 

 Rock hens in respect to the form and size of the comb. 

 The aim of the 'paper is purely descriptive, and it is regarded 

 by the authors as preliminary to the analytical investigation 

 of comb inheritance." 



The portion of this quotation which is here italicized 

 one would suppose to be a sufficiently clear statement 

 of the fact that the writers were studying or about 

 to undertake the study of the inheritance of comb 

 characters by the application of Mendelian methods 

 and that the present investigation was simply preliminary. 

 By " an analytical investigation of comb inheritance," 

 I meant and still mean a Mendelian investigation, in so 

 far as that I know of no way whereby one can determine 

 how a particular type of comb is inherited other than 

 by breeding birds which possess this type of comb amongst 

 themselves and with other breeds of fowls and studying 

 the individual pedigree records so obtained. Such 

 investigations I have been engaged upon for nearly 

 three years* now, and while I have not counted up 

 the number of pedigreed chicks that have passed through 

 my hands in this time, I fancy that it is certainly not 

 so far from the " 12,500 " with which " Ardent Men- 

 delian " endeavours to confound and overwhelm me. 

 I protest most vigorously against the intimation that 

 I am so stupid as to undertake a purely descriptive 

 biometrical investigation of variation, and only that 

 kind of an investigation, for the purpose of determining 

 whether the domestic fowl " breeds true " with reference 

 to comb characters ! 



(2) The next point which I wish to consider is as to 

 whether the objects which we had in mind, as set forth 

 above, in undertaking the investigation and publishing 

 the paper under discussion, were biologically valid. 

 I think they were, though I freeh^ admit that there is 

 room here for a difference of opinion (which is not the 

 case in regard to the matter of fact raised under 1). 

 While I grant unreservedly (and have, indeed, in the 



* It should be said that the Biometrika paper under discussion was 

 written in the earl}' fall of 1908, though it did not appear until well on in. 

 1909. 



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