VARIATIONS, DUE TO REVERSION. 108 



tion, and dependency, in organic nature, must, at some 

 time, have arisen by variation, to assert, as Darwin does 

 here, that he is compelled to ascribe the improvements 

 to reversion; because it is so difficult to believe that 

 they have arisen in any other way? 



On the same, and on the following page, he cites 

 other Startling improvements, which he says, he is 

 constrained to refer to reversion. He also says * 



" The case of the fifth stamen, in the peloric Antir- 

 rhinum, which is produced by the re-development of a 

 rudiment always present, * * * probably reveals 

 to us the state of the flower, as far as the stamens are 

 concerned, at some ancient epoch. It is also difficult 

 to believe, that the other four stamens, and the petals, 

 after an arrest of development, at a very early embry- 

 onic age, would have come to full perfection, in color, 

 structure, and function, unless these organs had, at 

 some former period, normally passed through a similar 

 course of growth. Hence it appears to me probable, 

 that the progenitor of the genus Antirrhinum, must, at 

 some remote epoch, have included five stamens, and 

 borne flowers, in some degree resembling those now 

 produced by the peloric form. 



" Lastly, I may add that many instances have been 

 recorded of flowers, not generally ranked as peloric, in 

 which certain organs, normally few in number, have 

 been abnormally augmented. As such an increase of 

 parts cannot be looked at as an arrest of development, 

 nor due to the re-development of rudiments, for no 

 rudiments are present, and as these additional parts 

 bring the plant into closer relationship with its natural 

 allies, they ought probably to be viewed as reversions 

 to a primordial condition." 



. These quotations, from Darwin's works, showing 



