Tlie Evidence from Hybrids. 135 



number, perhaps in nine out of every ten, the legs are 

 banded with transverse dark stripes." 



Mules with striped legs can be seen in great numbers 

 every day in the streets of Baltimore, and the peculiar- 

 ity is not in the least uncommon. 



Darwin gives a number of cases in which the same re- 

 version has been produced by the crossing of other horse- 

 like forms, and we must regard the tendency to revert to 

 a striped form when crossed as characteristic of the 

 horse family. 



Darwin says that when he crossed different varieties of 

 fowls he often got birds with faint traces of the peculiar 

 red plumage of the wild Gallus bankiva, and that this 

 plumage was almost perfectly reproduced in one mag- 

 nificent bird, the offspring of a black Spanish cock and a 

 white silk hen, although either of these pure breeds may 

 be reared by tens of thousands without the appearance 

 of a single red feather. 



Even long-lost instincts may be made to reappear by 

 crossing. The original wild ancestor of our domestic 

 fowls must, like all wild incubating birds, have had the 

 incubating instinct. Now when two non-sitting breeds 

 of fowls are crossed, the mongrels frequently recover 

 their incubating habit and sit with remarkable steadi- 

 ness. 



It is said that hybrids between perfectly tame domes- 

 tic animals are often as wild as their wild ancestors. 

 This has been noticed in cattle, pigs, fowls, ducks, and it 

 is probable that the same thing frequently shows itself 

 when widely separated human races are crossed, as such 

 good authorities as Livingston and Humboldt have re- 

 marked upon the savage character of half-caste human 

 beings. 



Another interesting resemblance between reversion and 



