126 THE THEORIES OF EVOLUTION 



Before being separated from the individual, the frag- 

 ment was, like the rest of the individual, intersected 

 by the network of micellar filaments. Those fila- 

 ments must therefore be so constituted as to contain 

 in every one of their parts micellar groups corre- 

 sponding to eve^ possible character. There is only 

 one way of accounting for this. Those groups must 

 be, so to speak, micellar files made up of identical 

 micellae joined end to end. 



In order to determine an elementary character those 

 files unite in the shape of strands; several strands 

 are necessary in order to determine complex charac- 

 ters and the union of all those strands constitutes the 

 continuous micellar cord. This structure of this 

 cord is uniform all over its length and any one of 

 its cross-sections would reveal all the strands or groups 

 of strands corresponding to every character. 



Such is the exact composition of the idioplasm ac- 

 cording to Naegeli, who advances other secondary 

 theories whenever new difficulties are encountered. 

 For instance, the natural conclusion to be drawn from 

 the foregoing is that the influence of the idioplasmic 

 cord should always be uniform ; it should not produce 

 different characters at different points. Yet that is 

 what it does. Naegeli explains that the various 

 strands are not all equally active on all their length; 

 active stretches are separated here and there by 

 stretches in a passive state. According to the various 



