918 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXIV. No. 887 



worm {Alabama argillacea Hubn.), it may be 

 wortb while to place on record the fact that 

 this insect has been very abundant in parts 

 of the south this year. Here at least, and if 

 one may judge from observations from a car 

 window, in northern Alabama as well, the cot- 

 ton has suffered also complete defoliation. 

 J. E. Watson 

 Floeida Agricultural 

 Experiment Station 



transplantation of ovaries 

 To THE Editor of Science: May I have 

 space in your columns to say a few final words 

 regarding the results of transplantation of 

 ovaries ? ^ 



Professor Castle has objected to my appli- 

 cation of the term mongrel to guinea-pigs 

 used by him in experiments which he claims 

 overthrow my results on chickens." My au- 

 thority for the use of this term is the follow- 

 ing extracts from his paper.' 



The ovaries were removed from an albino 

 guinea-pig and in their stead were placed two 

 ovaries, one from each of two black guinea- 

 pigs. The female bearing the engrafted 

 ovaries was subsequently bred to an albino 

 male and of the resulting six young, all were 

 black and red, and one had a white foot. In 

 explanation of this white foot, it is stated that 

 " Spotting characterized the race from which 

 the father came. He was himself horn in a 

 litter which contained spotted young. . . ."* 

 Therefore the male was a mongrel." 

 1 Science, N. S., 1911, XXXIII. 

 = Science, N. S., 1911, XXXIII. 

 ° Publication No. 144, Carnegie Institution, pp. 

 9-10. 



* Italics mine. 



" In an article by Professor Castle appearing in 

 The Popular Science Monthly under date of May, 

 1910, it is stated that in such an experiment six 

 young resulted and they were "all Hack" (italics 

 mine). From the data in my hands it is impossible 

 to conclude whether this is the same experiment 

 as that quoted above, and to which it bears a 

 striking similarity. If it is the identical experi- 

 ment, and this I assume in view of his more recent 

 statement (Publication No. 144, Carnegie Institu- 

 tion, 1911, p. 8) that but two of his successfully 

 operated animals had borne young, the article in 

 The Popular Science Monthly must be inaccurate. 



In the other instance, an albino female was 

 spayed and her ovaries replaced by the ovaries 

 of a brown-eyed cream guinea-pig.- The albino 

 female was then bred to an albino male and 

 two albino and one brown-eyed cream off- 

 spring resulted. In attempting to explain this 

 result, it is stated that " albinism occurred as 

 a recessive character in the particular brown- 

 eyed cream stock used. . . ."*' So it follows 

 that at least one of the females used in this 

 experiment was a mongrel, and was therefore, 

 as in the first experiment, entirely unsuited 

 to furnish any reliable information from the 

 standpoint of foster-mother influence. 



C. C. Guthrie 

 Physiological Laboratory, 

 University op Pittsburgh 



moulting and change of color of coat in 



MICE 



Mr. C. C. Little has, in a recent number 

 of Science (October 2Y, 1911), taken excep- 

 tion to certain statements that I made in an 

 article on the inheritance of coat colors in 

 mice. He believes that the unusual patterns 

 that I have described, especially in black mice, 

 which I attributed in part to a heterogeneous 

 condition, are only temporary effects and are 

 due to moulting. That the coat may appear 

 spotted at times of moulting is too familiar to 

 any one keeping these animals to call for com» 

 ment. But that the patterns that I described 

 are not due to this was shown by the fact, 

 stated in my paper, that the fully grown hair 

 was in all cases studied under the microscope 

 and the pigments in the hair recorded. 

 Moreover, the eases described were not inci- 

 dental to the coat-changing period, for the 

 pattern remained for several months until, in 

 fact, a new moult appeared. 



It is well known that black mice contain 

 both black and chocolate in the hair, even 

 when they produce only black mice. Hence 

 the opportunity is furnished for the local ex- 

 cess of one or of the other pigment to be- 

 come apparent. That such effects are due to 

 some " physiological conditions " present at 

 the time of moulting is very probable, and 

 was mentioned in my paper. Furthermore, in 



