148 EVOLUTION [Chai\ III 



Letter 99 the Natural Selection of monstrosities. You cannot do me a 

 greater service than by pointing out errors. I sincerely hope 

 that your work on monstrosities ' will soon appear, for I am 

 sure it will be highly instructive. 



Now for your notes, for which let me again thank you. 



(1) Your conclusion about parts developed 2 not being 

 extra variable agrees with Hooker's. You will see that I 

 have stated that the rule apparently does not hold with 

 plants, though it ought, if true, to hold good with them. 



(2) I cannot now remember in what work I saw the 

 statement about Peloria affecting the axis, but I know it was 

 one which I thought might be trusted. I consulted also 

 Dr. Falconer, and I think that he agreed to the truth of it ; 

 but I cannot now tell where to look for my notes. I had 

 been much struck with finding a Laburnum tree with the 

 terminal flowers alone in each raceme peloric, though not 

 perfectly regular. The Pelargonium case 3 in the Origin 

 seems to point in the same direction. 



(3) Thanks for the correction about furze : I found the 

 seedlings just sprouting, and was so much surprised at their 

 appearance that I sent them to Hooker ; but I never plainly 

 asked myself whether they were cotyledons or first leaves. 4 



(4) That is a curious fact about the seeds of the furze, the 

 more curious as I found with Leguminosa^ that immersion in 

 plain cold water for a very few days killed some kinds. 



If at any time anything should occur to you illustrating 

 or opposing my notions, and you have leisure to inform me, 

 I should be truly grateful, for I can plainly see that you have 

 wealth of knowledge. 



With respect to advancement or retrogression in organisa- 

 tion in monstrosities of the Compositae, etc., do you not find 

 it very difficult to define which is which ? 



Anyhow, most botanists seem to differ as widely as 

 possible on this head. 



1 Vegetable Teratology, London, 1869 (Ray Soc). 



2 See Origin of Species, Ed. 1., p. 153, on the variability of parts 

 " developed in an extraordinary manner in any one species, compared 

 with the other species of the same genus." See Life and Letters, II., 

 pp. 97, 98, also Letters 33, p. 74. 



3 Origin of Species, Edit. I., p. 145. 



4 The trifoliate leaves of furze seedlings are not cotyledons, but early 

 leaves : see Lubbock's Seedlings, I., p. 410, 



