42 Heredity, Variation and Genius 



tions to constitute the various tissues and organs, 

 some still retaining the capacity to reproduce 

 themselves, but all failing in the growing stiffness 

 of old age to do even that ; the reproductive cell 

 alone able to reproduce the whole body. And 

 not then except by conjunction of germs when, 

 as happened in process of differentiation the sexes 

 were separated, first on the same plant or animal 

 and afterwards on different individuals. But does 

 it therefore necessarily follow that the body-cells 

 lose all trace of original reproductive capacity, 

 or that the reproductive cell is nowise affected 

 by the modifications of their functions during the 

 life of the individual ? May it not be that morbid 

 growths sometimes tell of awakened memories ? 

 Specialized parts owning a remotely common 

 origin, notwithstanding their differentiations, are 

 certainly apt to retain silent memories of a general 

 function. It is noteworthy that the blind man's 

 face appears sometimes to regain a sensibility to 

 the proximity of objects which has long been the 

 special function of the differentiated visual sense ; 

 he feels with his face at a distance, so to speak, 

 the mother-sense of touch vaguely resuming in 

 stress of need functions long delegated to a 

 specialized organ of vision. What happens again 

 when fcetal structure is produced in another part 

 of the body than that which is its natural home ? 

 Is a particle of the cloistered nuclear plasm 

 broken off which after vague wanderings settles 

 there ? Or does a differentiated cell, suddenly 



