GENERAL PRINCIPLES OF BREEDING. 207 



7thly. As the female parent furnishes the greater part of the 

 materials of the egg in all animals, and also supports the young 

 of the vivipara during the period of utero-gestation, it might, 

 a priori, be assumed, that she would exert a greater influence 

 than the male upon the offspring, but the fact is not clearly 

 proved, and many cases may be adduced in which the character 

 of the offspring partakes even more of the male than the female, 

 though, as a whole, the preponderance of evidence is in favour of 

 the greater influence, in a small degree, of the female. 



Sthly. The influence of the male is not necessarily confined to 

 the period of conception only, since the semen itself continues to 

 exist for some time, and its ' sperm-cell ' is actually absorbed into 

 the f germ-cell ' of the ovum. So that the embryo is really part 

 and parcel of the father, as well as the mother, in whose favour 

 the only balance is the fact of her affording the entire nourishment 

 to the embryo from her own blood. 



9thly. The greater influence of one parent, in some cases, 

 seems to depend upon greater strength of constitution, either in 

 the individual, or in the stock, to which he or she, as the case may 

 be, belongs. 



lOthly. No general law is known as to the transmission by 

 either parent in particular of temperament, health, bodily or 

 mental power, colour, or conformation. In some animals, the 

 colour of each is combined without alteration, as in the piebald 

 and brindle, whilst in others, the shade is uniformly changed 

 to an intermediate stage between the two, as in the various shades 

 of blue and fawn, and in the mulatto of the human species. 



