SILVER WYANDOTTES LAWS OF BREEDING. 29 



that what we call species are only older varieties, and he justifies 

 himself in this generalization by showing that, under the hand of 

 man, by domestication and careful breeding, varieties may be pro- 

 duced that exhibit the marks of distinct species. 



Selection breeding, then, is capable of inducing marked devia- 

 tions from the original type. " But," Darwin argues, " if organic 

 beings had not possessed an inherent tendency to vary, man could 

 have done nothing. Man does not actually produce variability; he 

 only, unintentionally, exposes his animals and plants to new con- 

 ditions of life, and variability supervenes, which he cannot even 

 prevent or check." That is, man only exposes the new form, but 

 does not produce it. It must have been there potentially from the 

 beginning; it is evolved, not created. Living forms must possess, 

 not only the power to transmit their likenesses, but in favoring con- 

 ditions to vary widely, to transmit and so perpetuate and fix the 

 variations. In the wide field of nature, natural selection takes the 

 place of man's selection; an immense advantage, in Darwin's judg- 

 ment, as " man can act only on external and visible characters," 

 while nature "can act on every internal organ, on every shade of 

 constitutional difference, on the whole machinery of life." 



IN-BREEDING. We now come to the most important part of 

 the laws of breeding, and which interests every breeder more or 

 less. This question has been frequently discussed, and with few 

 unimportant exceptions, the great weight of authority opposes and 

 condemns this system, as fraught with the worst possible evils, even 

 to sterility, when carried to excess. We have given much study to 

 this subject, and know the many difficulties that come in the way of 

 the novice to avoid it, but we do believe, and we are the only one, to 

 our knowledge, who has put himself on record by saying, that long 

 continued incestuous breeding, in the absence of heredity transmis- 

 sion, or reversion to ancestral characters, causes variation from the 

 parent type, color and leading characteristics; and that some of the 

 so-called "sports of nature," in animals and birds, could be traced 

 to incestuous breeding. 



If space would permit, we think we could prove this point. We 

 hold, with Dr. Dawson and other eminent scientists, that the first of 

 every species was exceptionally perfect; but we are, perhaps, alone in 

 saying that variation never takes place while the natural laws are 

 strictly observed, and all under like conditions ; and the excep- 

 tions to this rule are mainly due to nervous impressions, or in other 

 words, sexual impressions, which are transmitted to one or more of 

 the offspring through the nervous system. 



