1893 EVIDENCE FOR PHYSIOLOGICAL SELECTION 333 



94 St. Aldate's, Oxford : June 22. 



Dear Dyer, — I received a letter from by the 



same post that brought yours of the 19th inst. From 

 it I gather that his opinion on the subject of telegony 

 has not changed in any material respect since our 

 inquiry began. His opinion has always been such as 

 you now quote (' atavism ' on the one hand, with a 

 small minority of ' dormant fertilisation ' cases on the 

 other). His has likewise always been my own view 

 (with the addition of coincidence), and has been cor- 

 roborated by the result of these inquiries. So I think 

 we are all three pretty well in agreement, because both 



and myself share in your doubts as to the 



minority of the cases being really due to dormant 

 fertilisation — i.e. not to be ascribed to coincidence or 

 mal-observation. Also, as I said before, I quite agree 

 with you that ' neither view is any help to Herbert 

 Spencer.' In fact, I have somewhat elaborately 

 sought to prove this in my ' Contemporary Eeview ' 

 article for April, and have been in private correspon- 

 dence with him ever since, but without getting any 

 'forerder.' 



But in this connection I should like to know 

 whether you have any opinion upon the apparently 

 analogous class of phenomena in plants which Darwin 

 gives in the eleventh chapter of his ' Variation,' &c. 

 Here, it seems to me, the evidence is much more 

 cogent and of far more importance to the issue, 

 Weismann v. Lamarck. Focke and Dr. Yris, however, 

 seem to doubt the facts or their interpretation, 

 although, as it seems to me, without presenting any 



