INHERITED MUTILATIONS. 105 



Hence they cannot reproduce the part in off- 

 spring. This explanation by no means implies 

 that mutilation would usually affect the offspring. 

 On the contrary, in all ordinary cases of mutilation 

 the purely atavistic elements or gemmules would 

 be set free from any modifying influence of the 

 non-existent or mutilated part. The gemmules 

 as in Galton's theory of heredity and with neuter 

 insects might be perfectly independent of pan- 

 genesis and the normal inheritance of acquired 

 characters. Such self-multiplying gemmules with- 

 out pangenesis would enable us to understand 

 both the excessive weakness or non-existence of 

 normal use-inheritance, and the excessive strength 

 and abruptness of the effect of their partial de- 

 struction under special pathological conditions. 



The series of epileptic phenomena that can be 

 excited by tickling a certain part of the cheek 

 and neck of the adult guinea-pig during the growth 

 and rejoining of the ends of the severed nerve, 



