PRE-BUFFONIAN AND GERMAN EVOLUTION. 69 



("Experiments in consort touching the degenerating 

 of plants, and the transmutation of them one into an- 

 other"), and is as follows : 



"518. This rule is certain, that plants for want of 

 culture degenerate to be baser in the same kind ; and 

 sometimes so far as to change into another kind. 

 1. The standing long and not being removed maketh 

 them degenerate. 2. Drought unless the earth, of itself, 

 be moist doth the like. 3. So doth removing into worse 

 earth, or forbearing to compost the earth ; as we see 

 that water mint turneth into field mint, and the colewort 

 into rape by neglect, &c." 



"525. It is certain that in very steril years corn 

 sown will grow to another kind : 



' Grandia ssepe quibus mandavimus hordca sulcis, 

 Infelix lolium, et steriles dominantur avense.' 



And generally it is a rule that plants that are brought 

 forth for culture, as corn, will sooner change into other 

 species, than those that come of themselves; for that 

 culture giveth but an adventitious nature, which is 

 more easily put off." 



Changed conditions, according to Bacon (though he 

 does not use these words), appear to be " the first rule 

 for the transmutation of plants." 



"But how much value," continues M. Geoffrey, 

 " ought to be attached to such prophetic glimpses, when 

 they were neither led up to, nor justified by any serious 

 study ? They are conjectures only, which, while bearing 

 evidence to the boldness or rashness of those who 

 hazarded them, remain almost without effect upon the 

 advance of science. Bacon excepted, they hardly deserve 



