110 LIFE OF 



occupied but a fraction of the time devoted to pigeons : 

 over twenty works are quoted for historical facts, skele- 

 tons of various rabbits were prepared and exhaustively 

 compared, the effects of use and disuse of parts traced, 

 most careful measurements are given, and a list of the 

 modifications which domestic rabbits have undergone, 

 with the probable causes, concludes the chapter. As tc 

 pigeons, no pigeon-fancier ought to be without the book, 

 for never assuredly was a sporting topic treated by so 

 great a thinker and so admirably. The numerous experi- 

 ments in crossing different breeds, and the results ob- 

 tained, make this one of the most instructive books for 

 all breeders. It would seem desirable that this portion 

 of the book should be issued in a separate form. Again, 

 when we turn to the sections on plants we see how in- 

 defatigable Darwin was, for he tells us that he cultivated 

 fifty-four varieties of gooseberries alone, and compared 

 them throughout in flower and fruit. 



The chapters on Inheritance, and on Reversion to 

 ancestral characters, or atavism, are profoundly sugges- 

 tive. What can be more wonderful, the author asks, 

 than that some trifling peculiarity should be transmitted 

 through a long course of development, and ultimately 

 reappear in the offspring when mature or even when old ? 

 Nevertheless, the real subject of surprise is not that a 

 character should be inherited, but that any should ever 

 fail to be inherited. Gradually leading up to the impor- 

 tant hypothesis with which the work closes, he observes 

 that to adequately explain the numerous characters that 

 reappear after intervals of one or more generations, we 

 must believe that a vast number of characters, capable 



