BUFFON 377 



to this : — (1) that a common plan of structure pervades 

 such vertebrates as he was acquainted with ; ' (2) that 

 some animals reputed to be of different species may 

 closely agree in structure, and be interfertile, at least 

 for one generation. His degeneration means simply 

 progressive change (of any kind). 



He believed (after his first confident statement to the 

 contrary) in the filiation of species, and was ever inclined 

 to extend it farther. He has much to say about the 

 origin of new species by degeneration, but neither this 

 nor any other hypothesis enables him to throw a clear 

 light upon the process of derivation of distinct species 

 from a common ancestor. 



A hybridising experiment. — More interesting than 

 all Buffon's speculations about hybridisation is an experi- 

 ment which, though unsuccessful, was well worth making. 

 A captive she-wolf, two or three months old, was shut up 

 in a courtyard with a mastiff" of the same age, and Buffon 

 vainly hoped to get a hybrid litter. The fellow-prisoners, 

 at first friendly, came to dislike one another extremely ; 

 in the end the dog killed the wolf, and his own temper 

 had grown so fierce that a few days later he too had to be 

 destroyed. Captive dog-foxes were tested with a suc- 

 cession of bitches, but the repugnance of the animals 

 was not to be overcome.^ A negative result was 

 apparently well made out. Buffon applied it, with 

 great satisfaction no doubt, to the refutation of Lin- 

 n£Bus, who had placed the dog, wolf, and fox in the 

 same genus (Canis). It is needless to enter into the 

 question between Buffon and Linnaeus, for a few years 



' Buffon thought he saw in all animals a common plan of structure, but this 

 is explained by his ignorance of all but vertebrates. Reaumur, in the Lettres 

 it un Amiricain, which bore the name of the Abbe de Lignae, had no difficulty 

 in pointing out animals which have no skeleton, no heart, &c. 



^Hist. Nat., Vol. V, p. 210. 



