ON THE "FIELD" AND "QUEEN" 143 



audience, and it strengthened the Field as a 

 journal appealing to the poultry and pigeon 

 interest. As editor of this department, Teget- 

 meier found his true vocation." 



His position on the Field necessarily brought 

 him into closer touch with the industrial aspects 

 of poultry-breeding, and the result before long 

 became manifest in the revision of his views. He 

 had been a member of the " Fancv," which bred 

 poultry and pigeons for curious " points," and 

 held the greatest exaggeration of fancy points 

 the greatest beauty, or at least, the great thing 

 at which to aim. These things were of interest 

 in their way, and possessed a certain scientific 

 value to the investigator of breeding problems, 

 as Darwin found when associated with Tegetmeier 

 in his work on Variation. But fancy points as 

 the main object of breeding were too trivial to 

 satisfy Tegetmeier : as he once wrote, when 

 speaking of his career, " the bent of my inclina- 

 tion has always been the practical application 

 of whatever amount of scientific knowledge I 

 possessed." While he recognised the use these 

 extravagances had been to the investigator of 

 biological problems, he revolted from the school 

 which was content to make these extravagances 

 the main object of breeding ; the exaggerated 

 importance attached to them disgusted him, and 

 he resolved to devote himself to the more utili- 

 tarian aspects of breeding — with the results we 



