DARWIN ON LOSS OF HOENS. 13 



of the loss of horns, any more than of the loss of hair, 

 both losses strongly tending to be inherited. It is, I 

 think, possible that the loss of horns has occurred often 

 since cattle were domesticated, though I can call to mind 

 only a case in Paraguay about a century ago. Is there not 

 a sub-breed of the so-called wild park cattle which is 

 hornless ? " 



In a communication to the authors, dated March 1, 

 1882, Dr John Alexander Smith of Edinburgh, whose in- 

 teresting ' Notes on the Ancient Cattle of Scotland ' have 

 already been referred to, also expresses his belief that the 

 absence of horns in certain breeds of cattle is " an acciden- 

 tal variety or peculiarity which might occur in any do- 

 mesticated herd." Professor Low evidently regards the 

 absence of horns as a departure from the original condi- 

 tion of things, but protests against the application of the 

 term " accident " to the organic change that gives rise to 

 such peculiarities. " There is nothing," he says, " in the 

 phenomena of nature to which the term accident can be 

 justly applied. The characters were doubtless the result 

 of some organic change proper to the animals in which 

 they appeared, and their transmission to their progeny is 

 only the exemplification of a law common to other cases 

 of transmitted characters. ... In the case of the 

 domesticated animals, we find similar evidences [as in 

 regard to the human race] of the wonderful permanence 

 of characters once acquired and imprinted on the animals. 

 In certain breeds of oxen and sheep, the animals retain 

 from generation to generation their distinctive marks, the 

 presence or absence of horns, the length and peculiar 

 bending of these appendages, and even the minutest varia- 

 tions of colour, as spots of white and black on certain 

 parts of the body." 



Other writers have expressed themselves in similar 

 terms ; and in the absence of proof to the contrary, the 

 conclusion would seem justifiable, that the want of horns 



