SOME BELIEFS OF PRACTICAL BREEDERS 571 



breeder to whom the attention of this instance was called remarked that, 

 although the color of this litter was strongly reminiscent of the white fox 

 terrier, the form and general characteristics were otherwise those of pure 

 Dachshunds. Accordingly he traced the pedigree of the dam and found 

 that in the sixth generation it ran back to the kennel of a lady whose 

 hobby was white Dachshunds with tan cheeks and ears. This particular 

 mating had simply given opportunity for the expression of latent factors 

 carried by the tan dogs. It was a perfectly intelligible case of rever- 

 sion, not telegony at all. 



Harmful Effects of Hybridization. Although we cannot accept the 

 belief in telegony, we must admit that bearing hybrid offspring may 

 sometimes have detrimental effects upon the dam. Thus Ewart quoting 

 from Baron de Parana calls attention to the practice in Brazil of breeders 

 of mules putting their mares to horses after they have reared two or 

 three mules in order to prevent them from becoming sterile. There is 

 a possibility that a hybrid fetus in consequence of its unusual vigor 

 may tax more strongly the resources of the dam and in a sense impoverish 

 her. This is particularly the case in some hybrids like those between the 

 bison and domestic cattle, the production of which is a tremendous 

 drain upon the dam's system and often leads to fatal consequences. 

 But this is not telegony, it is merely a consequence of disturbing the 

 physiological balance in the dam, and has nothing whatever to do with 

 the transference of the characters of a previous sire to offspring borne 

 subsequently to the service of another sire. 



Infection of the Male. The belief in infection of the male is by no 

 means as strong as that in telegony, but occasionally it is met with. 

 Ewart recites an incident of a breeder who refused to allow his Jersey 

 bull to serve Shetland cows for fear that the bull would subsequently 

 carry over old Shetland traits into his Jersey herd. Since we have, 

 however, discarded telegony as applied to the female, there appears to 

 be no warrant whatever for considering it in the male, where an effective 

 mechanism of operation is even less conceivable. Moreover, a vast 

 amount of evidence which has been obtained in Mendelian experiments 

 leaves no room whatever for this belief. 



Saturation. The doctrine of saturation is fundamentally based 

 upon a belief in the cumulative effect of telegony. It holds that succes- 

 sive children of given parents come to resemble the sire more and more 

 in their characters. Although this doctrine has been accorded some im- 

 portance at times, like the doctrine of telegony it finds no support from 

 experimental evidence. Here again we may point to the evidence from 

 Mendelian experiments, collected for another purpose, it is true, but 

 yielding direct evidence in opposition to the belief in saturation. More- 

 over, Pearson has collected statistical evidence in human beings with 



