112 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIII. No. 577. 



several seasons of unusual rains, and the river, 

 therefore, simply marks a rise of the ground- 

 water level to a point above that of the valley 

 bottom. It is believed that it will disappear 

 when the ground-water is again reduced to its 

 normal level. M. L. Fuller, 



Secretary. 



UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO SCIENTIFIC SOCIETY. 



During November and December, 1905, the 

 society held seven meetings. The papers pre- 

 sented were as follows : 



Pbofessok M. F. Libby : ' Growth in Childhood 

 and Adolescence.' 



Dk. E. Bakbek QuEAii : ' The Causes of Dys- 

 pepsia.' 



Pkofessor Charles C. Ateb : ' The Phonograph 

 in Modern Language Teaching.' 



Db. William P. Harlow : ' The Blood in Health 

 and Disease.' 



Judge Junius Henderson : ' Extinct and Ex- 

 isting Glaciers of Colorado.' 



Dr. Luman M. Giffin : ' The Necessity for 

 Pure Water.' 



Pbofessob M. S. Ketchum : ' Sources of Water- 

 Supplies and Methods of Distribution.' 



Db. Dessie B. Robertson : ' Methods of Bac- 

 teriological Analysis of Water.' 



Dk. George H. Cattebmole : ' The Pollution of 

 Water-Supplies.' 



Pbofessob Francis Ramaley : ' Noted Typhoid 

 Epidemics.' 



Two evenings were given to the papers de- 

 voted to the subject of water supplies. An 

 attempt is being made by the society to inform 

 the public in regard to proper means of se- 

 curing good water. At a city election held in 

 Boulder shortly after these meetings the vote 

 was overwhelmingly in favor of the extension 

 of the water-works. It is thought that the 

 influence of the society was considerable in 

 bringing about this result. 



Francis Ramaley, 



Secretary. 



Boulder, Colo., 

 December 22, 1905. 



DISCUSSION AND CORRESPONDENCE. 



MENDELIAN INHERITANCE AND THE PURITY OF 

 THE GAMETES. 



The communication on the above subject 

 by my friend and colleague Professor Morgan, 



printed in the issue of Science for December 

 29, offers an ingenious if somewhat compli- 

 cated interpretation of Mendelian inheritance 

 that is at variance with the current conception 

 in that it substitutes for a disjunction of 

 allelomorphic characters in the gamete-forma- 

 tion a reversal of dominance in half the 

 gametes (which evidently involves some kind 

 of disjunction of the factors that determine 

 dominance). That a complete elimination 

 of the dominant character does not take place 

 in the production of albinos (this character 

 still being present in what Castle has called 

 the ' latent ' state) has been clearly recognized 

 by several experimenters and is beautifully 

 demonstrated by Cuenot's work on mice; but 

 Professor Morgan's attempt to find a general 

 basis for the explanation of this is a new and 

 interesting contribution to the subject. I 

 think, however, that his effort to explain the 

 very case (that of Cuenot's yellow mice) that 

 suggested his new interpretation, involves a 

 negation of Cuenot's experimental results. 

 This observer found that yellow was invariably 

 dominant to all other colors, but that after 

 crossing yellow mice with pure-bred grays (or 

 other colors) the yellow mice of F.., contrary 

 to his expectation, included no pure extracted 

 dominants, nor could such a race be obtained 

 from them. In order to explain this, Cuenot 

 advances the hypothesis that the yellow-bear- 

 ing gametes are sterile to one another or do not 

 unite, i. e., a selective fertilization occurs, such 

 that the yellow-bearing gametes are fertilized 

 only by those bearing other colors. The inter- 

 est of the question in relation to sex-production 

 (which I have discussed in a paper now in 

 course of publication) leads me to offer a word 

 of criticism, since I am unable to share Pro- 

 fessor Morgan's belief that his assumption 

 will take the place of Cuenot's hypothesis. 

 This belief rests, I think, on a misconception 

 of Cuenot's results regarding the behavior of 

 the yellow mice of F„ which possibly arose 

 through a confusion of Cuenot's formulas 

 with his statement of fact. 



How was the constitution of these mice 

 tested ? As in all similar cases, by the nature 

 of their offspring, and Cuenot clearly specifies 

 two methods by which the test was applied. 



