INADEQUACY OF NATURAL SELECTION, ETC. 669 



the variation, the reduction, or a part of the reduction, was made 

 a trait of the species. Now, in the first place, a necessary im- 

 plication is that this minus variation was maintained in posterity. 

 80 far from having reason to suppose this, we have reason to 

 suppose the contrary. As before quoted, Mr. Darwin says that 

 " unless carefully preserved by man," " any particular varia- 

 tion would generally be lost by crossing, reversion, and the acci- 

 dental destruction of the varying individuals." * And Mr. Galton, 

 in his essay on '' Regression towards Mediocrity," f contends that 

 not only do deviations of the whole organism from the mean size 

 tend to thus disappear, but that deviations in its components do 

 so. Hence the chances are against such minus variation being so 

 preserved as to affect the species by panmixia. In the second 

 place, supposing it to be preserved, may we reasonably assume 

 that, by inter-crossing, this decrease, amounting to about a 

 millionth part of the creature's weight, will gradually affect the 

 constitutions of all Razor-back Whales distributed over the Arctic 

 seas and the North Atlantic Ocean, from Greenland to the Equa- 

 . tor ? Is this a credible conclusion ? For three reasons, then, the 

 hypothesis must be rejected. 



Thus, the only reasonable interpretation is the inheritance of 

 acquired characters. If the effects of use and disuse, which are 

 known causes of change in each individual, influence succeeding 

 individuals — if functionally-produced modifications of structure 

 are transmissible, as well as modifications of structure otherwise 

 arising — then this reduction of the whale's hind limbs to minute 

 rudiments is accounted for. The cause has been unceasingly 

 operative on all individuals of the species ever since the trans- 

 formation began. 



In one case see all. If this cause has thus operated on tlie 

 limbs of the whale, it has thus operated in all creatures on all 

 parts having active functions. 



At the outset I intimated that I must limit my replies to 

 those arguments of Professor Weismann which are contained in 

 his first article. That those contained in his second might be 

 dealt with no less effectually, did time and space permit, is mani- 

 fest to me ; but about the probability of this the reader must 

 form his own judgment. My replies thus far may be summed up 

 as follows : — 



Professor Weismann says he has disproved the conclusion that 

 degeneration of the little toe has resulted from inheritance of ac- 

 quired characters. But his reasoning fails against an interpre- 

 tation he overlooks. A profound modification of the hind limbs 



* The Variation of Anhnah and Plants under Domesfication, vol. ii, p. 292. 

 j Jowmal of the Anthropological Ins'itute for 1885, p. 253. 



