ISKG.] MR. J. B. SUTTON ON ATAVISM. 55/ 



part of the female, or the acquisition of new characters by the male, 

 or at any rate increased functional importance of certain organs 

 possessed, when in the state of hermaphroditism, by all the forms. 

 15y natural selection the male would acquire (or, if already in his 

 possession in a functional condition, they would become more 

 developed) means for seizing and retaining the female, such as the 

 claspers of sharks, the callous pads of frogs, &c. Paternal duty 

 requires the male to protect the young and defend the females from 

 harm ; hence horns, teeth (as in the musk-ox), spurs, tusks, &c. 

 become more developed in him. 



The duties of the female require her not only to furnish the 

 material out of which the young are to be formed, but in many cases 

 she is required to provide them with nutrition long after they enter 

 tlie world. The material which the female thus provides is of the 

 very kind necessary, in many instances, to build up such structures 

 as horns, tusks, teeth, and the like. Further, this material is 

 required by the female at the corresponding period of life in which 

 they become developed in the male, viz. on tlie advent of puberty. 

 We may state with certainty that a distinct correlation exists 

 between the generative organs of the female and the development of 

 the secondary sexual male characters. The more developed and 

 functional the female reproductive organs become, the less likely is 

 she to manifest the secondary characters of the male. It may be 

 argued, that in some cases the female simulates the male, as in the 

 few examples of female Deer possessing horns. Quite true ; but so 

 long as the female is engaged in the duties of reproduction, these 

 secondary characters are never developed to the same extent as in the 

 functional male. It must also be borne in mind, that in cases where 

 sterile females, or those which have ceased to bear young, put on 

 external male characters, they rarely attain such proportions or 

 beauty as in the male ; for in the males the general excitement 

 produced upon the system by sexual passion has a most powerful 

 stimulant effect upon the growth and development of these structures, 

 which is wanting in the female. So that in her attempts to emulate 

 the male she succeeds to a certain degree, but rarely, if ever, attains 

 to so good a condition. 



Hunter has recorded some experiments which have a bearing on 

 this matter : — 



*' I wished also to ascertain if the parts peculiar to the male could 

 grow on the female, and if the parts of a female, on the contrary, 

 would grow on a male. 



" Although I had formerly transplanted the testicles of a cock into 

 the abdomen of a hen, and they had sometimes taken root there, but 

 not frequently, and then had never come to perfection, yet the 

 experiment could not, from this cause, answer fully the intended 

 purpose ; there is, I believe, a natural reason to believe it could not, 

 and the experiment was therefore disregarded. I took the spur 

 from the leg of a young cock, and placed it in the situation of the 

 spur in the leg of a hen-chicken ; it took root, the chicken grew to 

 a hen, but at first no spur grew, while the spur that was left on the 



