LAW OF VARIATION. 35 



Similar examples are numerous among our common 

 useful plants, and among flowers the dahlia and ver- 

 bena furnish an illustration of countless varieties, 

 embracing numberless hues and combinations of color, 

 from purest white through nearly all the tints of the 

 rainbow to almost black, of divers bights too, and 

 habits of growth, springing up under the hand of culti- 

 vation in a few years from plants which at first yielded 

 only a comparatively unattractive and self-colored 

 flower. In brief, it may be said, that nearly or quite 

 all the choicest productions both of our kitchen and 

 flower gardens are due to variations induced by cul- 

 tivation in a course of years from plants which in their 

 natural condition would scarcely attract a passing 

 glance. 



We cannot say what might have been the original 

 type of many of our domestic animals, for the inquiry 

 would carry us beyond any record of history or tra- 

 dition regarding it, but few doubt that all our varieties 

 of the horse, the ox, the sheep and the dog, sprang 

 each originally from a single type, and that the count- 

 less variations are due to causes connected with their 

 domestication. Of those reclaimed within the period 

 of memory may be named the turkey. This was un- 

 known to the inhabitants of the old continent until 

 discovered here in a wild state. Since then, having 



