88 DEGENERATION [CHAP. 



Inductive reasoning is ample to support the 

 contention that the degenerative structures in 

 the above and many others are the result of the 

 conditions of life starvation on the one hand, 

 and supersaturation by water on the other. 

 Such are the results of response to the con- 

 ditions of life, by which though degraded 

 they are the best they can do under the circum- 

 stances in adaptation to their environments, 

 respectively. Yet all the features are hereditary, 

 and recognised as " specific " or " generic " 

 characters. 



It has often been said that when cultivated 

 plants are neglected they will revert to the wild 

 form from which they have been raised. This 

 is not always strictly the case. As all plants 

 will degenerate if they cannot get proper and 

 sufficient nourishment, as shown in the above 

 cases of wild flowers, so especially is it with 

 " ennobled " herbs, etc. ; but they do not appear 

 ever to recover actually and completely the 

 structures characteristic of the original wild 

 plants from which they have been descended ; 

 apples degenerate to the " crab " state, but never 

 to the original wild crab. The structure of the 

 root of a carrot, for example, is so profoundly 

 altered under cultivation that it has become 

 perfectly hereditary, but it is impossible to take 

 on the actual wiry structure of Daucus Carota, 

 though it may more or less approximate it. 



