Chap. XIII. REVERSION. 27 



racters properly confined to the female are likewise acquired 

 by the male ; the capon takes to sitting on eggs, and will 

 bring lip chickens ; and what is more curious, the utterly 

 sterile male hybrids from the pheasant and the fowl act in 

 the same manner, " their delight being to watch when the 

 hens leave their nests, and to take on themselves the office of 

 a sitter." 57 That admirable observer Reaumur 5S asserts that 

 a cock, by being long confined in solitude and darkness, can 

 be taught to take charge of young chickens; he then utters 

 a peculiar cry, and retains during his whole life this newly 

 acquired maternal instinct. The many well-ascertained cases 

 of various male mammals giving milk shows that their rudi- 

 mentary mammary glands retain this capacity in a latent 

 condition. 



We thus see that in many, probably in all cases, the 

 secondary characters of each sex lie dormant or latent in the 

 opposite sex, ready to be evolved under peculiar circumstances. 

 "We can thus understand how, for instance, it is possible for 

 a good milking cow to transmit her good qualities through 

 her male offspring to future generations ; for we may confi- 

 dently believe that these qualities are present, though latent, 

 in the males of each generation. So it is with the game-cock, 

 who can transmit his superiority in courage and vigour 

 through his female to his male offspring ; and with man it is 

 known 59 that diseases, such as hydrocele, necessarily confined 

 to the male sex, can be transmitted through the female to the 

 grandson. Such cases as these offer, as was remarked at the 

 commencement of this chapter, the simplest possible examples 

 of reversion ; and they are intelligible on the belief that 

 characters common to the grandparent and grandchild of the 

 same sex are present, though latent, in the intermediate 

 parent of the opposite sex. 



The subject of latent characters is so important, as we shall 

 see in a future chapter, that I will give another illustration. 

 Many animals have the right and left sides of their body 



57 < Cottage Gardener,' 1860, p. 5D Sir H. Holland, < Medical Notes 

 379. and Reflections,' 3rd edit., 1855, p< 



58 'Art de faire Eclore,' &c, 1749, 31. 

 torn. ii. p. 8. 



AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY- 



189S 

 LIBRARY 



