GREGOR MENDEL 179 



same facts were independently rediscovered in 1899 

 by de Vries working in Holland, by Correns in Germany, 

 and by Tschermak in Austria. 



Gregor Johann Mendel was born on July 22, 1822, 

 at Heinzendorf, near Odrau, in Austrian Silesia. In 

 1843 he entered as a novice the Augustine Convent at 

 Altbrunn, and was ordained priest in 1847. 



Mendel was a teacher of natural science in the Brunn 

 Realschule from 1853 to 1868, when he was appointed 

 Abbot of his monastery. During this time he was 

 largely occupied with experiments in cross-breeding a 

 great variety of plants, and some idea of his activity 

 in this line of scientific work is to be gathered from a 

 perusal of his letters to the German biologist Nageli, 

 a correspondence which has recently been published 

 by Professor Correns. Mendel himself only published 

 the result of his work with peas, and that of a few of 

 his experiments with Hieracium. 



After 1873 the cares associated with the position of 

 Abbot of Brunn appear to have prevented further 

 biological work. His death took place in 1884, two 

 years after that of Charles Darwin, to whom Mendel 

 was thirteen years junior. 



Mendel's own experiments that is to say, the 

 chief ones published by him were made with peas, a 

 kind of plants which were found to be remarkably 

 well suited to this kind of work. Seven pairs of 

 characters in these plants were found to behave in 

 precisely the same manner as those characters of the 

 maize-plant which have already been described, and 

 in all of them the phenomenon of dominance also 



12 2 



