250 BIOLOGY: GENERAL AND MEDICAL 



"The facts of inheritance and what we know regarding its 

 histological basis entirely refute the hypothesis that the biophore 

 molecules as a whole undergo chemical union. We may therefore 

 conceive these, in the first place, as lying side by side in a common 

 cytoplasm or, to be more exact, nuclear sac, in the process of 

 assimilation attracting ions in the surrounding medium, building 

 these up into side chains of different orders. Of these side chains 

 some are identical common, that is, to the molecules of both sets 

 of biophores some, on the other hand, of unlike constitution, so 

 that certain side chains having corresponding position or attach- 

 ments in the two sets of parental biophores are dissimilar. As 

 demonstrated by studies upon immunity, we regard such side 

 chains as detachable and apt to be detached, that is, to be devel- 

 oped in excess, and then becoming loose, passing into the sur- 

 rounding cytoplasm. Again, as we have pointed out, we must 

 regard growth and increase in the number of biophores, as brought 

 about in the first instance by the building up of nuclei or side-chain 

 matter, this matter attracting other matter in due order, so that 

 gradually new rings are constituted new biophores. If these 

 views be correct, then, when the molecules of closely allied con- 

 stitution and properties are growing side by side, what is there 

 in this process to determine that side-chain matter which has been 

 liberated under the influence of one set of biophores and has 

 become detached does not become attracted to and built up into 

 the substance of the l growing biophores' of the other set? I 

 cannot but hold that under these conditions that is, conditions 

 under which we have compound molecules of very similar structure 

 becoming built up side by side this must inevitably occur in a 

 common fluid medium. 



" Whenever a greater affinity exists between the components of 

 one growing biophore and certain side-chain nuclei developed under 

 the influence of the molecules of the other set of biophores, then 

 these nuclei will be apt to be built into, to become an integral part 

 of, the new biophores, to the exclusion of the corresponding nuclei 

 those proper to the original molecules. In short, there will be, 

 physically speaking, a contest between the two orders of growing 

 biophores, and, to a certain degree, a selection or rearrangement 

 of constituent nuclei. This rearrangement in the simplest case 

 will result in an interchange of constituent parts; in other cases 

 may result in side-chain material derived from one parental 

 biophore, and possessing powerful affinities to the growing bio- 

 phores of both orders, becoming built up into both sets, to the 

 exclusion of corresponding but weaker side chains (so that these 

 become wholly cast out) and with this the properties determined 

 by their presence disappear in the next generation. In other cases, 

 again, we can premise an interaction between certain side-chain 

 groups derived from the two parental biophores, the resultants 

 of this interaction becoming built up into the growing biophores, 

 the interaction having as a result either an exaltation or a depres- 

 sion of parental character or, again, leading to the production of 

 mutation. 



" Granted, that is, that in its brood lines we have come to realize 



