292 



VARIATION OF PLANTS AND ANIMALS. [Ch. XXXVI. 



succession of generations, or as long as an entire species 



endures on the earth. 



Before this new hypothesis was started, it was sufficiently 

 difficult to conceive how a microscopic cell or ovule, so minute 



some 



requiring the aid of a powerful microscope to be made visible, 

 should contain within it not only the characters of the species 

 but many of the peculiarities of one or both parents, including 



r.f +>,a;v npniiirpfl individual habits and instincts. But 



some 



imaarme 



are innumerable other molecules, in each germ or ovule, in 

 which the characteristics of remote progenitors may also be 

 present. As bearing on the question of the possible minute- 

 ness of particles of organic matter, I shall have to refer in a 

 future chapter, p. 387, to the ten million sporules of a single 

 fungus which were counted by Fries. 



more 



diminutive ness oi m 



manner in 



atoms may 



perfumed or tainted throughout large spaces by the odour 



of a plant or animal 



contagious particles of 

 atmosphere, until they are 



at last received within a human body, where they rapidly 

 increase and act powerfully. 



Assuming, then, that the number of cell-gemmules in an 

 undeveloped embryo may be almost infinite in number, we 

 have to explain how some of these, after having been long 

 transmitted in a latent state, may suddenly multiply and gain 

 an ascendancy when individuals belonging to two distinct 

 races are crossed. Among other facts which are somewhat 

 analoo-ous, we are reminded that, although there is frequently 

 in the offspring a fusion of all the characters of the parents, 

 yet occasionally some of the characters of one parent are 

 exclusively transmitted to one of the children and those of 

 the other parent to another. The characters of one parent 

 sometimes prevail in all the offspring to the exclusion 

 of those of the other. When Gartner crossed white and 



muUe 



became 



blossoms 



must 



I 



