86 CREATIVE EVOLUTION CHAP, 



of precisely this convulsion-causing poison. If so, the 

 toxin passed from the guinea-pig to its spermatozoon 

 or ovum, and caused in the development of the 

 embryo a general disturbance, which, however, had 

 no visible effects except at one point or another of 

 the organism when developed. In that case, what 

 occurred would have been somewhat the same as in 

 the experiments of Charrin, Delamare, and Moussu, 

 where guinea-pigs in gestation, whose liver or kidney 

 was injured, transmitted the lesion to their progeny, 

 simply because the injury to the mother s organ had 

 given rise to specific &quot; cytotoxins &quot; which acted on the 

 corresponding organ of the foetus. 1 It is true that, in 

 these experiments, as in a former observation of the 

 same physiologists, 2 it was the already formed foetus 

 that was influenced by the toxins. But other researches 

 of Charrin have resulted in showing that the same 

 effect may be produced, by an analogous process, on 

 the spermatozoa and the ova. 8 To conclude, then : 

 the inheritance of an acquired peculiarity in the ex 

 periments of Brown-Sequard can be explained by the 

 effect of a toxin on the germ. The lesion, however 

 well localised it seems, is transmitted by the same 

 process as, for instance, the taint of alcoholism. But 

 may it not be the same in the case of every acquired 

 peculiarity that has become hereditary ? 



There is, indeed, one point on which both those 

 who affirm and those who deny the transmissibility of 



1 Charrin, Delamare and Moussu, &quot;Transmission expdrimentale aux 

 descendants de Idsions developpees chez les ascendants &quot; (C.R. de I Acad. des 

 Sciences, vol. cxxxv., 1902, p. 191). Cf. Morgan, Evolution and Adaptation, 

 p. 257, and Delage, L HfrSJitS, and edition, p. 388. 



2 Charrin and Delamare, &quot; He&quot;redite cellulaire &quot; (C.R. de I Acad. del 

 Sciences, vol. cxxxiii., 1901, pp. 69-71). 



3 Charrin, &quot; L Heredit6 pathologique &quot; (Revue gfatrale des sciences, 15 

 Janvier 1896). 



