TELEGONY 75 



marize, deal with heredity and cognate matters, and 

 although they are so far from complete that the 

 results hitherto obtained cannot be regarded as final, 

 they mark an important stage in the history of the 

 subject. 



Twelve years ago Professor Ewart began to collect 

 materials for the study of the embryology of the horse, 

 about which, owing to the costliness of the necessary 

 investigations, very little is at present known. At 

 the same time he determined to inquire into certain 

 theories of heredity which have for centuries influ- 

 enced the breeders of horses and cattle, and the belief 

 in which has played a large part in the production of 

 our more highly bred domestic animals. Foremost 

 amongst these is the view widely held amongst 

 breeders that a sire influences all the later progeny ol 

 a dam which has once produced a foal to him. This 

 belief in the ' infection of the germ,' or ' throwing- 

 back' to a previous sire, is probably an old one, 

 possibly as old as the similar faith in maternal im- 

 pressions which led Jacob to placed peeled wands 

 before the cattle and sheep of his father-in-law Laban. 

 The phenomenon has recently been endowed with a 

 new name — Telegony. Since the publication of Lord 

 Morton's letter to Dr. W. H. Wollaston, President of 

 the Royal Society, in 1820, it has attracted the atten- 

 tion, not only of practical breeders, but of theoretical 

 men of science. The supporters of telegony, when 

 pressed by opponents, having almost always fallen 

 back on Lord Morton's mare, it will be well to recall 

 the chief incidents in the history of this classic animal. 



It appears that early in last century Lord Morton 

 was desirous of domesticating the quagga. He 

 succeeded in obtaining a male, but, failing to procure 

 a female, he put him to a young chestnut mare of 

 seven-eighths Arab blood which had never been bred 

 from before. The result was the production of a 



