January 19, 191 1] 



NATURE 



371 



ceae, and other plants that are generally recognised to 

 be suitable for the purpose. The chief essentials to 

 success are carefully prepared soil, good lighting, 

 judicious watering, and, in many cases, an unheated 

 room for winter storage; the good results observable 

 in cottage rooms are quite in accord with the last 

 condition. 



The author first instructs in general processes, such 

 as watering, potting, sowing, and the like, and then 

 gives special directions for each plant or group of 

 similar plants, arranging them according to habit. 

 The instructions are full, clear and explanatory, so 

 that anvone with an ambition for cultivating such 

 plants as those named above without a greenhouse 

 will be well advised to consult the book and work 

 upon the lines indicated. 



Flashes from the Orient, or a Thousand and One 



Mornings with Poesy. In four books. Spring, 



Summer, Autumn, and Winter. Book third. 



Autumn. By John Hazelhurst. Pp. x + 280. 



(London and Aylesbury : Hazell, Watson and Viney, 



Ltd., 1910.) Price 15. 6d. net. 



Readers familiar with Mr. Hazelhurst's sonnets on 



summer will turn with interest to his verses dealing 



with subjects suggested by the phenomena and events 



connected with the fall of the year. His subjects 



range from •" Enthusiasm " to " Misery," and from 



"The Sewing Machine" to "The Dome of Heaven"; 



and he finds music in them all. 



LETTERS TO THE EDITOR. 



[The Editor does not hold himself responsible for opinions 

 expressed by his correspondents. Neither can he undertake 

 to return, or to correspond with the writers of, rejected 

 manuscripts intended for this or any other part of Nature. 

 No notice is taken of anonymous communications.] 



The Inheritance of Acquired Characters. 



I AM rather disposed to think that Prof. Judd is right 

 In saying that this " and similar problems were constantly 

 "present to Darwin's ever-open mind." They seem to me, 

 indeed, to underlie the whole of the discussions in the 

 second volume of the " \'ariation of Plants and Animals 

 under Domestication"; and I believe it is generally con- 

 sidered that Darwin put forward his theory of " pan- 

 ^ nesis " to account for the cases where some amount of 

 rect influence of the environment appeared to be 

 .herited. 



The passage which Prof. Meldola quotes from the sixth 



dition of the " Origin " occurs word for word in the 



first (p. 44). It is interesting to note that in the interval 



between the two Darwin never saw any ground for alter- 



■ ig the statement, though he modified others on the same 



age. I can have little doubt that, at any rate so far as 



!ants are concerned, " the source of his . . . authority 



r " it is to be found in Alph. de Candolle's " great and 



^mirable work," as Darwin calls it (" Origin," sixth 



lition, p. 89), " G6ographie Botanique raisonn6e." 



i hat appeared in 1855, and there is abundant internal 



vidence to show that it received from Darwin the most 



rrentive study. 



Great and admirable it certainly is, but it is impossible 



>t to feel in reading it that, perhaps in the whole history 



t science, there has never been a more striking case of a 



>up manque. For de Candolle had the same problem 



^fore him as Darwin, and he attacks it by the same 



■^thod of patiently accumulating and sifting facts. He 



,'asps the action of variation, heredity, and of cultural 



lection, but he fails to grasp the idea that nature might 



•perate on the same lines as the cultivator, and natural 



lection constantly e.ludes him as it did Herbert Spencer. 



It is true that de Candolle does not absolutely reject the 



ffect of the environment, but he was led to the con- 



usion that it would act, if at all, with such extreme 



' Jwness as to be practically ineffective. It is difTicuIt to 



~,:ve a brief quotation, but the following may suffice : — 



NO. 2 15 I, VOL. 85] 



"Toutes les fois qu'il a 6t6 question de I'influence du 

 climat sur les v6g6taux, je me sais efforc^ de combattre 

 I'opinion d'une acclimatation, c'est k dire d'un changement 

 dans la nature des espies qui les rende, apres quelques 

 generations, plus aptes k r^sister au.x influences d^favorables 

 d'un climat. J'ai applaudi au mot spirituel de du Petit — 

 Thouars : ' L'acclimatation, cette douce chimfere de la cul- 

 ture ' " (pp. 1087-88). 



It must I think be evident that, though he does not 

 actually quote it, Darwin, from his use of the word 

 " chimaera " ("Variation," ii., 313), has this passage in his 

 mind. But he goes on to show that the problem is at once 

 solved by natural selection. He states this, however, with 

 his usual caution : — " Though habit does something towards 

 acclimatisation, yet . . . the spontaneous appearance of 

 constitutionally different individuals is a far more effective 

 agent " (loc. cit., 314), and though he appears, in the main, 

 to have relied on de Candolle, he took some trouble to in- 

 vestigate the question for himself : — ^" Can we feel sure 

 that our kidney-beans are not somewhat hardier? I have 

 not been able, by searching old horticultural works, to 

 answer this question satisfactorily." 



I think, then, that it was upon de Candolle's conclusions, 

 supported by his own investigations, that Darwin based the 

 pregnant sentence which Prof. Meldola has quoted. .And 

 how pregnant every word in the book is can be little appre- 

 ciated except by those who have more than a bowing 

 acquaintance with its pages. 



I cannot but agree with Prof. Judd that modern evolu- 

 tionary theory had its root in Lyell. Nor do I think that 

 in the cold light of history it will seem to " be going 

 too far ... to assert that if the Principles of Geology 

 had not been written, we should never have had the Origin 

 of Species." If the possession of Darwin is the glory of 

 Cambridge, it is pleasant for a member of the sister 

 university — though it says little about it — to know that it 

 is secure in that of Lyell. 



W. T. Thiselton-Dyer. 



Witcombe. 



Palaeolithic Shaft-straighteners. 



Ix a previous communication to Nature (vol. Ixxiv., 

 p. 372, 1906) I directed attention to some Eskimos' arrow- 

 straighteners which present a closer resemblance to th^ 

 famous batons de Commandement of the Magdalenian age 

 than any which had been previously described. 



Last summer, when my friend Sir. Marrett and I were 

 returning from Toulouse, 

 where we had enjoyed the 

 hospitality of the French 

 Association, we stayed at Peri- 

 gueux on our way to some 

 of the painted caves of Les 

 Eyzies. We were fortunate 

 in our choice of an hotel, for 

 our host, M. L. Didon, 

 proved to be an enthusiastic 

 investigator of the caves in 

 the neighbourhood. His col- 

 lection of .Aurignacian bone 

 implements, obtained by him 

 from the Aurignacian station 

 of Castelmeule, is the finest I 

 have seen, and, I should 

 think, unrivalled anywhere. 

 M. Didon informs me that he 

 has completed its description, 

 which will be published in the 

 course of the winter. 



The number and variety of 

 the bone implements obtained 

 from this single locality, 

 dating from a period so long 

 anterior to the Magdalenian, 

 greatly impressed us, but the 

 objects which most aroused 

 my interest were three shaft- 



straighteners (see Fig.V These, while presenting a general 

 resemblance to the Magdalenian batons, make a still 

 nearer approach to those of the Eskimos previously re- 



