Genetics. An Introduction to the Study of Heredity 
By HERBERT EUGENE WALTER 
Assistant Professor of Biology, Brown University 
Cloth, r2mo, $1.50 net; postpaid, $1.63 
In his “ Genetics ” Professor Walter summarizes the more re- 
cent phases of the study of heredity and gives to the non-technical 
readers a clear introduction to questions that are at present agitat- 
ing the biological world. 
Professor Walter’s conception of sexual reproduction is that it 
is a device for doubling the possible variations in the offspring, by 
the mingling of two strains of germ plasm. The weight of prob- 
ability, he concludes, is decidedly against the time-honored belief 
in the inheritance of acquired characters. Professor Walter also 
predicts that the key to this whole problem will be furnished by 
the chemist, and that the final analysis of the matter of the 
“heritage carriers ” will be seen to be chemical rather than mor- 
phological in nature. In the practical application of this theory to 
human conservation or eugenics, it would follow that the only con- 
trol that a man has over the inheritance of his children is in 
selecting his wife. Professor Walter holds, if only modifications 
of the germ plasm can count in inheritance, and if these modifica- 
tions come wholly from the combination of two germ plasms, then 
the only method of hereditary influence is in this selection. 
“T find that it is a very useful study for an introduction to the subject. Professor 
Walter has certainly made one of the clearest statements of the matters involved 
that I have seen, and has made a book which students will find very useful because 
he keeps everything in such entirely simple and clear outlines, and at the same 
time he has brought the book up to date.”— PROFESSOR LOOMIS of Amherst 
College. 
“JT am.much pleased with it and congratulate you upon securing so excellent a 
treatment. It is one of the most readable scientific books I have, and goes uner- 
tingly to the fundamentals of our most recent advances in the experimental study of 
heredity as well as those of the older studies." — PROFESSOR GEORGE H. SHULL, 
Cold Spring Harbor, Long Island, N. Y. 
“There was a decided need for just such a work. The book strikes me as most 
excellently done,” — PROFESSOR H. S, JENNINGS, Johns Hopkins University. 
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 
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