Retrograde Varieties 129 



Presently we shall look into these characters 

 more in detail and then we shall find that they 

 are not so simple as might be supposed at first 

 sight ; but precisely because we are so familiar 

 with them, we readily see that their different 

 features really belong to a single character; 

 while in elementary species everything is so 

 new that it is impossible for us to discern the 

 unities of the new attributes. 



If we bear in mind all these difficulties we 

 cannot wonder at the confusion on this ques- 

 tion that seems to prevail everywhere. Some 

 authors following Linnaeus simply call all the 

 subdivisions of species and varieties, others fol- 

 low Jordan and avoid the difficulty by desig- 

 nating all smaller forms directly as species. 

 The ablest systematists prefer to consider the 

 ordinary species as collective groups, calling 

 their constituents " The elements of the spe- 

 cies," as was done by A. P. De Candolle, Alph. 

 De Candolle and Lindley. 



By this method they clearly point out the dif- 

 ference between the subdivisions of wild spe- 

 cies as they ordinarily occur, and the varieties 

 in our gardens, which would be very rare, were 

 they not singled out and preserved. 



Our familiarity with a character and our 

 grounds for calling it an old acquaintance may 

 result from two causes, which in judging a new 



