[Jan. 19,. 
Cope. ] 318 
to the old theory, the varieties have a common origin, and the species an. 
independent one. To cite examples of what is asserted, the monograph 
of the Tenebrionide, by Dr. Horn, in the Transactions of this Society, 
especially the genus Hleodes, may be mentioned, or the essay on the genus 
Piychostomus, in the writer’s ‘Fishes of North Carolina,’’ in the Pro- 
ceedings of the Society, may be consulted. 
It is true that in but few of these cases have the varieties been seen to 
be bred from common parents, a circumstance entirely owing to the diffi- 
culties of observation. The reasoning derived from the relations of dif- 
ferences appears to be conclusive as to their common origin, unless we 
are prepared to adopt the opposite view that the varieties have originated 
separately. As these avowedly grade into individual variations, we must 
at once be led to believe that individuals have been created independently: 
a manifest absurdity. 
But variations in the same brood have been found among wild animals 
for example, both the red and gray varieties of the little horned owl 
(Scops asio) have been taken from the same nest. 
As further examples of gradation between species and varieties, found 
in nature, I only have to select those genera most numerous in species 
and best studied. Among Birds: Corvus, Hipidonax, Buteo, Falco, ete. ; 
Reptiles: Hutenia, Anolis, Lycodon, Naja, Caudisona, Hlaps, Oxyr- 
rhopus, ete. ; Batrachia: Rana, Hyla, Chorophilus, Borborocoetes, Ambly- 
stoma, Spelerpes, ete. ; Fishes: Ptychostomus, Photogenis, Plecostomus, 
Amiturus, Perca, and many others. 
These protean genera are not the majority of those known to naturalists, 
but are quite numerous. That the variability depends on a peculiar con- 
dition of the animals themselves, and not on domestication, excepting in 
so far as it produces these conditions, is plain not only from the above 
facts, but from those observed in domestication. It is well known that 
while pigeons, fowls, cattle, dogs, ete., are very variable or ‘‘ protean,” 
the pea-fowl (Pavo) has maintained its specific characters with great ac- 
curacy, during a period of domestication as long as that of the other 
species named. The same may be said of the Guinea (Nwmidia) and the 
Turkey (Meleagris). These facts show that domestication is only a 
remote cause of variability. 
Second. That hybrids do not occur among wild animals, ete. The 
affirmative of this question is no more important to the view of evolution. 
than the reverse ; nevertheless, if hybridization be regarded by any as 
evidence of common origin, as the author of ‘Phases of Modern Philoso- 
phy,”’ ete., believes, then some wild species are undoubtedly descended 
from the same parents. There are a few fertile hybrids in nature, though 
some animals have been stated to be such without sufficient evidence ; for 
example, the Oolaptes ayresii (woodpecker) is thought by Professor Baird 
to be a permanent hybrid between the Eastern C. ornatus and Californian 
C. mecieanus, and as it occupied the region between the two (Upper Mis- 
souri) there is every reason to believe that such is the case, especially as 
