no LUCK, OR CUNNING? 



others without rumps. Mr. Buffoa " (who, by the way, 

 surely, was no more " Mr. Buffon " than Lord Salis- 

 bury is " Mr. Salisbury ") " mentions a breed of dogs 

 without tails which are common at Eome and Naples 

 — which he supposes to have been produced by a 

 custom long established of cutting their tails close off." * 



Here not one of the causes of variation adduced is 

 connected with use and disuse, or effort, volition, and 

 purpose; the manner, moreover, in which they are 

 brought forward is not that of one who shows signs 

 of recalcitrancy about admitting other causes of modi- 

 fication as well as use and disuse; indeed, a little 

 lower down he almost appears to assign the subordi- 

 nate place to functionally produced modifications, for 

 he says — " Fifthly, from their first rudiments or prim- 

 ordium to the termination of their lives, all animals 

 undergo perpetual transformations ; which are in part 

 prodwxd by their own exertions in consequence of 

 their desires and aversions, of their pleasures and their 

 pains, or of irritations or of associations ; and many 

 of these acquired forms or propensities are transmitted 

 to their posterity." 



I have quoted enough to show that Dr. Erasmus 

 Darwin would have protested against the supposition 

 that functionally produced modifications were an 

 adequate explanation of all the phenomena of organic 

 modification. He declares accident and the chances 

 and changes of this mortal life to be potent and fre- 

 quent causes of variations, which, being not infre- 

 quently inherited, result in the formation of varieties 



* Zoonomia, vol. i. p. 505, 



