502 ■-I'HE DESCENT OF MAN. 



quer other males, and have been transferred more or less com- 

 pletely to the female. 



The effects of castration deserve notice, as throwing light on this 

 same point. Stags after the operation never renew their horns. 

 The male reindeer, however, must be excepted, as after castration 

 he does renew them. This fact as well as the possession of horns by 

 both sexes, seem at first to prove that the horns in this species do 

 not constitute a sexual character;" but as they axe developed at 

 a very early age, before the sexes differ in constitution, it is not 

 surprising that they should be unaffected by castration, even it 

 they were aboriginally acquired by the male. With sheep both 

 sexes properly bear horns; and I am informed that with Welsh 

 sheep the horns of the males are considerably reduced by castra> 

 tion; but the degree depends much on the age at which the opera- 

 tion is performed, as is likewise the case with other animals. 

 Merino rams have large horns, whilst the ewes "generally speak- 

 "ing are without horns;" and in this breed castration seems to pro- 

 duce a somewhat greater effect, so that if performed at an early 

 age the horns "remain almost undeveloped."" On the Guinea 

 coast there is a breed in which the females never bear horns, and, 

 as Mr. Winwood Reade informs me, the rams after castration are 

 quite destitute of them. With' cattle, the horns of the males are 

 much altered by castration; for instead of being short and thick, 

 they become longer than those of the cow, but otherwise resemble 

 them. The Antilope bezoartica offers a somewhat analogous case: 

 the males have long straight spiral horns, nearly parallel to each 

 other, and directed backwards; the females occasionally bear 

 horns, but these when present are of a very different shape, for 

 they are not spiral, and spreading widely, bend round with the 

 points forwards. Now it is a remarkable fact that, In the cas- 

 trated male, as Mr. Blyth informs me, the horns are of the same 

 peculiar shape as in the female, but longer and thicker. It we 

 may judge from analogy, the female probably shows us, in these 

 two cases of cattle and the antelope, the former condition of the 

 horns in some early progenitor of each species. But why castra- 

 tion should lead to the reappearance of an early condition of the 

 horns cannot be explained with any certainty. Nevertheless, it 

 seems probable, that in nearly the same manner as the consti- 

 tutional disturbance in the offspring, caused by a cross between 



" This Is the conclusion of Seidlitz, 'Die Darwinsche Theorle,' 1871, 

 p. 47. 



'' I am much obliged to Prof. Victor Carus, for having- made in- 

 quiries for me in Saxony on this sub.iect. H. von Nathusius ('Vieh- 

 zucht,' 1872, p. 64) says that the horns of sheep castrated at an early 

 period, either altogether disappear or remain as mere rudiments; but 

 I do not know whether he refers to merinos or to ordinary breeds. 



