OCTOBEB 4, 1912] 



SCIENCE 



443 



change-professors," "Amerika Houses," and 

 the like is familiar. Even more noteworthy 

 this spring was the attention given to the 

 work of American scholars. At least, this 

 was noticeable in the writer's department of 

 philosophy. At Erlangen, Falckenberg had 

 recently granted a doctorate based on the 

 study of Dewey's pragmatism. In Heidel- 

 berg, Troeltsch, beginning his course on the 

 philosophy of religion "for members of all 

 faculties," was discussing pragmatism (as 

 weU as the work of the English anthropol- 

 ogists). In Jena, Eucken's "TJebungen" 

 were based on Wobbermin's translation of 

 James's " Varieties of Eeligious Experience." 

 It would be too much to say that this interest 

 in recent phases of our thinking always indi- 

 cates agreement. One rather gathers the im- 

 pression from German scholars that the prag- 

 matic philosophy is not gaining, but losing 

 ground. But it was an agreeable reminder 

 that the scholars and the scholarship of the 

 two nations have come into closer touch. 

 Our indebtedness to the German universities 

 is large. And for some time yet we will con- 

 tinue, if we are wise, to increase our obliga- 

 tions, accepting more than we attempt to 

 give in return. But it was not unwelcome to 

 discover that some beginning of repayment 

 had been made. A. 0. Armstrong 



Wesleyan Univeesitt 



SPECIAL ASTICLE8 



ANOTHER VIEW OF SEX-LIMITED INHERITANCE 



Among results which were obtained by the 

 writer during several years of work in cross- 

 ing blond ring-doves (Turtur risorius) with 

 white ring-doves (T. alba), was sex-limited 

 inheritance. When the male bird is white, 

 i. e., recessive, the offspring in Ej are about 

 equally white or blond like one parent or the 

 other, and the white birds are all females. 

 By the reciprocal cross, all of the F^ offspring 

 are blonds like the male parent. 



The blond and the white ring-doves may be 

 distinguished by a group of characters which 

 behave apparently as a unit, so that a simple 

 formula may be used to represent the situa- 

 tion. The white ring-dove differs from the 



blond bird as foUows: (1) melanin pigment is 

 almost entirely absent in the feathers; (2) 

 there is little of this pigment in the skin ; and 

 (3) the eyes contain extremely little melanin 

 pigment except in the iris region. In other 

 words, the dominant characters of the blond 

 bird are represented in the white dove in an 

 extremely dilute or very slightly developed 

 form, but they are not entirely absent. Their 

 appearance suggests strongly the idea that 

 development has been arrested. 



The late Professor Whitman obtained white 

 females in F^, when white male ring-doves 

 were crossed with females of the very different 

 species, Turtur humilis. This result is men- 

 tioned by Bateson.^ A similar result has been 

 described by Staples-Browne'' for a cross be- 

 tween a male white ring-dove and females of 

 another very different species, Turtur turtur. 



A number of other cases as well as these 

 have the common characteristic that recessive 

 Fj offspring appear when the male parent is 

 recessive, and these individuals are always 

 females. Dominant characters are borne by 

 the Fj males and sometimes by F^ females. 

 Thus, two dominant females were obtained 

 by Durham and Marryat' with canaries and 

 two by the writer with ring-doves, in crossing 

 recessive males with dominant females. 



Cases of sex-limited inheritance which 

 have occurred in animals, and especially with 

 birds, have been interpreted by Spillman,* 

 Bateson^ and others with the following as- 



'Bateson, "Meadel's Principles of Heredity," 

 University Press, Cambridge, England, 1909, p. 

 194. 



' Staples-Brovme, ' ' Second Eeport on the In- 

 heritance of Color in Pigeons, together with an 

 Account of some Experiments on the Crossing of 

 certain Eaees of Doves, with special reference to 

 Sex-limited Inheritance," Jr. Genetics, 1912, Vol. 

 2, No. 2, pp. 131-162, plates VI.--IX. 



° Durham and Marryat, "Note on the Inherit- 

 ance of Sex in Canaries," Eeport to the Evolution 

 Committee, Boy. Soc, 1909, IV., pp. 57-60. 



* Spillman, ' ' Spurious Allelomorphism : Eesults 

 of Eeeent Investigations," Am. Nat., Vol. 42, 

 1909, pp. 610-615. 



'Bateson, "Mendel's Principles of Heredity," 

 University Press, Cambridge, England, 1909, 396 



