Genetics. An Introduction to the Study of Heredity 

 By HERBERT EUGENE WALTER 



Associate Professor of Biology, Brown University 



Clolh, i2mo, $i.so net 



In his "Genetics" Professor Walter summarizes the more re- 

 cent phases of the study of heredity and gives to the non-technical 

 reader a clear introduction to questions that are at present agitating 

 the biological world, and which are of particular importance to all 

 those interested in the evolutionary or hereditary problems of 

 breeding. 



Professor Walter's conception of sexual reproduction is that it is a 

 device for douMing the possible variations in the offspring, by the 

 mingling of two strains of germ plasm. The weight of probability, 

 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 morphological in nature. 

 Professor Walter holds, if only modifications of the germ plasm can 

 count in inheritance, and if these modifications come wholly from 

 the combination of two germ plasms, then the only method of heredi- 

 tary influence is in the selection of parents. 



This book is now widely used as a class text in courses on the 

 breeding of animals or plants given in the agricultural colleges. 



" I 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 mat- 

 ters 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 out- 

 lines, and at the same time he has brought the book up to date." — PROFESSOR 

 Frederic B. Loomis, Amherst College. 



" I am much pleased with it and congratulate you upon securing so excel- 

 lent a treatment. It is one of the most readable scientific books I have, and 

 goes unerringly to the fundamentals of our most recent advances in the experi- 

 mental study of heredity as well as those of the older studies." — PifOFESSOR 

 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. 



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