A TA VI SM OR RE VERSION. 1 5 1 



common bantam, and there we see that not only certain 

 masculine characters proper to the Sebright bantam, 

 but other masculine characters derived from the first 

 progenitors of the breed removed by a period of above 

 sixty years were lying latent in this hen-bird ready to 

 be evolved as soon as her ovaria became diseased." 

 (Animals and Plants under Domestication.) 



These examples open up the subject of secondary 

 sexual characters. The question of primitive herma- 

 phroditism has been already discussed in a preceding 

 chapter, and an attempt was made to show that, for a 

 brief period at least, the embryo presents sexual parts 

 common to the male and female, so that for a time it is 

 absolutely impossible to determine the sex. What is 

 true of the embryo applies equally to animals normally 

 hermaphrodite : no distinctive characters are displayed 

 externally. Also in cases of hermaphroditism occurring 

 in animals normally bisexual, the secondary sexual 

 characters are intermediate to those of the functional 

 male and female. It is therefore fairly evident that the 

 female, though she differs from the male in the non- 

 development of secondary sexual characters, yet pos- 

 sesses them in a latent condition ; or, to put the matter 

 briefly, they are transmitted, but not developed. 



We must now inquire how it is, that if the female 

 possesses all the secondary sexual characters of the male 

 in a latent manner, they are prevented manifesting 

 themselves. 



When differentiation of sex occurs in animals pre- 

 viously hermaphrodite, it involves either the loss of certain 

 characters on the part of the female, or the acquisition 



