INHERITED HABITS. 75 



and that retrievers inherit the effects of their 

 training. 1 But selection and imitation are so 

 potent that the additional hypothesis of use- 

 inheritance seems perfectly superfluous. Where 

 intelligence is not highly valued and carefully 

 promoted by selection, the intelligence derivable 

 from association with man does not appear 

 to be inherited. Lap-dogs, for instance, are often 

 remarkably stupid. 



Darwin also instances the inheritance of dex- 

 terity in seal-catching as a case of use-inheritance. 2 

 But this is amply explained by the ordinary 



law of heredity. All that is needed is that the 



Jp 



son shall inherit the suitable faculties which the 

 father inherited before him. 



1 Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication ii. 367. 

 Why then does the cheetah inherit ancestral habits so inade- 

 quately that it is useless for the chase unless it has first learned to 

 hunt for itself before being captured ? (ii. 133). 



2 Descent of Man, p. 33. 



