Origin of Species and Varieties 599 



or even a wholly indifferent one, might easily be 

 produced, it would have been so, long ago, and 

 would at the present time simply exist as a sys- 

 tematic variety. If produced anew somewhere 

 the botanist would take it for the old variety 

 and would omit to make any inquiry as to its 

 local origin. 



Thousands of seeds with perhaps wide circles 

 of variability are ripened each year, but only 

 those that belong to the existing old narrow 

 circles survive. How different would Nature 

 appear to us if she were free to evolve all her 

 potentialities ! 



Darwin himself was struck with this lack of 

 harmony between common observations and the 

 probable real state of things. He discussed 

 it in connection with the cranesbill of the 

 Pyrenees (Geranium pyrenaicum). He de- 

 scribed how this fine little plant, which has never 

 been extensively cultivated, had escaped from a 

 garden in Staffordshire and had succeeded in 

 multiplying itself so as to occupy a large area. 

 In doing so it had evidently found place for an 

 uncommonly large number of plantlets from its 

 seeds and correspondingly it had commenced to 

 vary in almost all organs and qualities and 

 nearly in all imaginable directions. It dis- 

 played under these exceptional circumstances a 

 capacity which never had been exceeded and 



