22 (i) No decisive evidence, 



exploded by Weismann and his followers; 

 and this has naturally led to a general 

 distrust of the rest. Yet, as a singularly 

 fair-minded and acute biologist, Delage, main- 

 tains, the evidence is still formidable ; for as 

 another Lamarckian has said, "transforma- 

 tion... acts as if the direct action of the 

 environment and the habits of the animal 

 [the parent animal that is to say] were 

 the efficient cause of the change, and any 

 explanation which excludes the direct action 

 of such agencies is confronted by the diffi- 

 culty of an immense number of the most 

 striking coincidences ^" 



Yes, the Weismannians reply, we allow 

 that appearances all point in the Lamarck- 

 ian direction, but inasmuch as the modus 

 operandi of the transmission is altogether 



^ Professor W. B. Scott, American Journal of Morphology^ 

 1891, p. 395. 



