LAWS OF GALTON AND MENDEL 185 



some symbiotic microbe which determines characters 

 corresponding to certain diatheses." 3 The represent- 

 ative particles are simply independent organisms, mi- 

 crobes, which are lacking in ordinary cases of mechan- 

 ical characters but are superadded to the ovum in 

 other cases, and whose presence produces ornamental 

 or descriptive characters. To interpret the process in 

 this way is simply to substitute Pasteur's terminology 

 for Weismann's without altering any of the facts, for 

 as far as their definition and the properties attributed 

 to them are concerned, representative particles and 

 microbes are identical. The only difference between 

 them is that, instead of being parasitic like microbes, 

 representative particles are symbiotic, that is, live the 

 life of the organism. The characters determined by 

 them, however, serve no purpose in the formation of 

 species. 



Le Dantec interprets the Mendelian theory of 

 heredity as follows: Two individuals of the same 

 species but of different varieties are crossed; one of 

 them is characterised by diathesis a, the other by dia- 

 thesis b. The ovum from which the hybrid will issue 

 is made up of the egg proper to the species under 

 observation and of two microbes, one of which deter- 

 mines diathesis a, the other diathesis b. The individ- 

 ual born from that ovum will belong to the same 

 species as its parents but will be endowed with a 



2 La Crise du Iransformisme, p. 211, 



