6io 



NA TURE 



[April 30, igoj 



recent visit to Germany has so greatly impressed my friend 

 Prof. Hubrecht of Utrecht, to whom I told it, that I 

 venture to think you will find it of sufficient interest to be 

 laid before your readers. 



My Mster, Frau Prof. Grosse of Brunswick, |m .srws 

 an old bullfinch which pipes, among other tunes, " God 

 Save the King " beautifully, even embellishing it now and 

 then with some charming iittle gracenotes. For some lime 

 he was the only bird in the house, until, about a year ago, 

 my sister received the present of a canary bird, a lovely but 

 untrained songster, singing, as they say in Germany, " as 

 his beak was grown." 



The cages containing the two birds stood in tw,. adjoining 

 rooms. At 'first one of the birds would be silent when the 

 other was singing. Gradually however the young canary- 

 bird commenced to imitate the tune of the bullfinch, trying 

 more and more of it at a time, until after nearly a year's 

 study he had completely mastered it, and could pipe it quite 

 independently by himself. As I said before, this, in a canary 

 bird, though a rare accomplishment, i. nothing very extra- 

 ordinary or unheard of. 



Now, however, I come to my point. What 1 am going 

 to relate seems to me so wonderful that I should < onsider 

 it absolutely incredible had I not with my own ear. heard 

 it, not once, but dozens of times within the few days of 

 my visit. 



When the bullfinch, as sometimes happened, would, after 

 ibe first half of the tune, stop a liltle longer than the rhvthm 

 of the melody warranted, the canary would take up the 

 tune where the bullfinch had stopped, and properly finish 

 :t. This, then, is what I heard : — 



J }>UCf4. 



( <i~> X~£- Ij^f-m ) 



I should be glad to read in a further issue of your pap<" 

 whether you share my astonishment, or if any of your i 

 can perhaps recall, or have ever heard of, a similar ex- 

 perience. George Hi w m i 



Kensington, April. 



Mendel's Principles of Heredity in Mice 

 In Nature oi March iq Mr. Bateson refused to discuss 

 the eye-colour of Mr. Darbishire's mice as a simple 

 character, separable from coat-colour. He then treated 

 Mr. Darbishire's results as dependent on gametes of two 

 kinds; one, G, bearing the characters "white coat and 

 pink eye,'' the other, G', bearing " colour in the coat and 

 pink eye." The hybrids resulting from the cross were said 

 to be of constitution GG', and their offspring were repre- 

 sented, in constitution and in relative frequency, b) 

 GG+aGG'+G'G'. 

 Hybrids are here represented, as producing gametes of 

 two kinds only, each kind like that of one pure race ; eye- 

 colour and coat-colour are transmitted together in i ne un- 

 resolved " allelomorph." The mice in any one of the three 

 groups are said to be formed from similar pairs of gain, tes, 

 and they should themselves be similar; but they are net] 

 The colour in the coat of a mouse GG' may be yellow, or 

 - mil- shade of wild-colour, or black ; that of a mouse G G' 

 ui.i\ be yellow, fawn, or " lilac." 



In Nature of April 23 Mr. Bateson abandons his first 

 formula; he now says (1) that more titan two kinds of 

 gametes take part in the first crosses, since the gametes 

 of one or both pure races are heterogeneous; (2) thai coat- 

 colour is split into simpler elements when the hybrids form 

 -gametes. The heterogeneity of gametes in two races, both 

 oi which breed true, while one has been declared by Mr. 

 Bateson to be universally re,,ssi\,., ] s a doctrine too 

 ng for brief treatment; I therefore consider only the 

 -'"iid of the new assumptions. 



NO. 1748, VOL. 67] 



The hypothesis of March 19, invoking only two kinds of 

 gametes, supposes that one out of every four offspring of 

 hybrids will be a recessive albino, and this is not contra- 

 dicted by the facts : but the hypothesis regards black and 

 yellow coat-colour as produced by identical pairs of gametes. 

 The new hypothesis provides different gametic elements for 

 the black and for the yellow mice, but it reduces the number 

 of " recessive " albinos among the offspring of hybrids to 

 a maximum of one in nine. The two " Mendelian predic- 

 tions " which Mr. Bateson has so far uttered ex post facto 

 are mutually contradictory ; with which of them is the in- 

 heritance of coat-colour " in punctilious agreement "? 



Oxford, April 24. VY. F. R. VYelcon. 



The Discovery of Japan. 



From a review in Nature of November 13, 1902 (vol. lxvii. 

 p. 28), I gather Herr Hans Haas, like many ether writers 

 on Japan, considers Ser Marco Polo the first who brought 

 any news of Japan to the west. In this connection, it will 

 be interesting to note that in his "Six Voyages," Paris, 

 1676, Tavernier tries to identify a local name of the classic 

 geographers, Jabadi, if 1 remember correctly, with the 

 ancient vernacular designation of the empire, Yamato, or 

 rather with its Chinese rendering, Yamadai or Jabatai. 



Whether iliis identity be true or net, it is almost certain 

 that Japan was well known to the mediaeval Arabs much 

 prior to Marco Polo. In a French translation of the 

 " Voyages ol the Two Arabs in the Ninth Century, " an island 

 near China is mentioned the inhabitants of which used to 

 s :nd a tribute to the latter, in the firm belief that it would 

 make their own country peaceful. This island seems to point 

 to Japan, the story being apparently a version of the legend, 

 recorded in Wang Chung's "Fun Hang," first century 

 A.D., that under Ching-Wang of the Chau dvnastv (c. 1100 

 B.C.), China enjoyed such an extraordinary peace that it 

 caused even the winds and waves in the neighbouring States 

 to be perfectly calm, on which account the people of Lacs 

 gave him thanks by their envoys, who reached the capital 

 after several years' journey, and the Japanese made him pre- 

 sents of the Sally Herb (now supposed to mean the Angelica 

 Kiusiami, Maximowicz). The " Second Annals of Japan 

 mentions several Arabs, including women, passing into or 

 becoming settled in Japan during the eighth and ninth 

 centuries. This is no wonder, for, in those ages, China 

 under the grand dynasty of Tang was so prosperous and 

 powerful that nearly all Asiatic peoples of significance 

 vied in asking her favours, and they saw each other very 

 frequently in that empire ; besides, doubtless there were 

 many Japanese who passed through China into the lands 

 then called her territories or tributaries; thus, Twan Ching- 

 Shih, in his " Miscellany," written ninth century A.D., 

 speaks of his meeting with a Japanese priest, who came 

 back from his travels in India, where he witnessed the 

 figures of the famous Chinese pilgrim, Hiuen-Tsiang, re- 

 vered in the Buddhist churches. Indeed, the " Second 

 Annals " relates how, in the year 753 A.D., the Japanese 

 ambassador was successful in a dispute with the Arabian 

 about the first seat of honour on occasion of a state banquet 

 on the New Vear's Day. Add to these, in the " Hokuhen 

 Zuihitsu," written eighteenth century, it is argued that in 

 the Middle Ages there were mutual acquaintances between 

 the Japanese and the Persians. 



When we see in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries 

 (in part) the Spaniards and Portuguese flourishing in the 

 Japanese pints under the native appellation Namban, or 

 South Barbarians, it is very striking to find in a memoir 

 evidently written in the fifteenth century, entitled " The 

 Successions of Governors of a County in Wakasa " (in 

 Hanawa's "Collection," ed. 1894, p. 375 ), the following 

 passage : — 



" June 22, 1408. A vessel of the Nambans arrived (in the 

 province of Wakasa). Their emperor's name is Arekishinkei, 

 and the envoy's Mongwan-hon-a. His Majesty's presents 

 to the Japanese emperor were a living black elephant, a 

 mountain-horse (sic) t two pairs respectively of the pea- 

 fowl and parrots, and various other articles. The ship 

 was wrecked by a storm, and stranded on November 18, 

 but, after being reconstructed, started for China on October 

 1, 1409." 



