BREEDS AND THE PRINCIPLES OF BREEDING. 423 



of type. And these hereditary powers are very largely under our control, to be increased or 

 diminished by our own course of action. 



If we take two animals to breed together, both possessing a strong similarity of type, 

 the result we shall have will be an offspring possessing the like character, but in a higher 

 degree. The result of putting together two animals of a strong similarity of characteristics is 

 not only to perpetuate their corresponding peculiarities, but to intensify them in the offspring; 

 that is, if the parents actually possess a striking similarity of type in any given point, each 

 successive generation which they produce receives an increase of hereditary force, or an 

 increase of power in transmitting its peculiar stamp upon its young. It is a cumulative 

 power. But if this hereditary power accumulates, and becomes stronger and stronger, with 

 a strong similarity in the parents to start from, it absolutely and invariably diminishes, if 

 the parents, instead of possessing similarity of character, really possess an opposite or 

 antagonistic character. 



It reminds us of the familiar and well-known principle of mathematics, that two plus or 

 positive quantities multiplied together will produce a far larger plus or positive quantity as 

 the product; while if we multiply two unlike quantities, a plus and a minus, for instance, the 

 result will be a minus, or negative quantity. 



Professor Tanner, who is entitled to be regarded as high authority on this and kindred 

 subjects, puts the matter somewhat like this: 



Suppose, for example, we have a well-bred ram, that, by long and careful breeding 

 through several generations, has acquired certain strong and valuable hereditary powers, and 

 suppose these powers, for the sake of illustration, are equal to 100, if they could be expressed 

 in figures. Now, suppose we put this rarn to a ewe of a different character, one that has 

 been cross-bred, or bred without any care or system, very much as our native sheep or our 

 common cattle have been bred. She has, of course, far less hereditary power, far less fixity 

 of type and strength of blood, as we say. Her hereditary power may be represented, we 

 will suppose, by 60. 



The result would be a lamb possessing very much the same characteristics as the ram, 

 because we have seen the ram possessed a greatly superior hereditary power. To the eye he 

 may look very like his father: but the hereditary capacity of this lamb will be greatly 

 reduced, and his power of transmitting his peculiar characteristics will be represented by 

 100 60 = 40. He may still look to the eye about as good as his father; but he will possess 

 less than half his father s hereditary power, and less even than that of his mother. In other 

 words, he may have all the perfection of form and marked characteristics; but his power of 

 transmitting these peculiarities will be only in the proportion of 40 to 100, and for a breeding 

 animal to get stock from he will be worth less than half as much as his sire. 



In other words, if you select animals of a similarity of type, that is, if the likeness is 

 strongly marked and well developed in both parents, the young will not only possess the same 

 character as the parents, but it will possess an increased or multiplied power of hereditary 

 transmission of these characteristics. But opposite characteristics mutually weaken each 

 other s influence, and the offspring will have the power of hereditary transmission only in a 

 greatly reduced degree. The exact proportion of this reduction of the power of transmission, 

 or hereditary power, may not be precisely like that stated by Professor Tanner; but it will 

 correspond with it in the main, and sufficiently for illustration. 



These are a few general and well-established principles which have been arrived at by 

 the most skillful and scientific breeders during the last half or three-quarters of a century; 

 and it would be idle to dispute them, or to deny their force. 



&quot;We are to bear in mind also, that this capability of transmitting the qualities or 

 characteristics from the parent to the offspring is not limited to any one peculiarity of the 

 animal, like the secretion of milk, the disposition to take on fat, the strength of constitution, 



