22 The American Naturalist. [January, 



But these or similar variations in cuttings are the common- 

 est experiences of gardeners. Whilst some philosophers are 

 contending that all variation comes through sexual union, the 

 gardener has proof day by day that it is not so. In fact, he 

 does not stop to consider the difference between seedlings and 

 sexless plants in his efforts to improve a type, for he knows by 

 experience that he is able to modify his plants in an equal 

 degree, whatever the origin of the plants may have been. 

 Very many of our best domestic plants are selections from 

 plants which are always grown from cuttings or other asexual 

 parts. A fruitgrower asked me to inspect a new blackberry 

 which he had raised. " What is its parentage ? " I asked. 

 " Simply a selection from an extra good plant of Snyder " he 

 answered ; that is, selection by means of suckers, not by seed- 

 lings. The variety was clearly distinct from Snyder, where- 

 upon I named it for him. The Snyder plants were originally 

 all equal, all divisions in fact, of one plant, but because of 

 change of soil or some other condition, some of the plants 

 varied, and one of them, at least, is now the parent of a new 

 variety. 



But even Mr. Weismann would agree to all this, only he 

 would add that these variations are of no use to the next gen- 

 eration, because he assumes that they cannot be perpetuated. 

 Now, there are several ways of looking at this Weismannian 

 philosophy. In the first place, so far as plants are concerned 

 in it, it is mere assumption, and, therefore, does not demand 

 refutation. In the second place, there is abundant asexual 

 variation in flowering plants, as we have seen ; and most 

 fungi, which have run into numberless forms, are sexless. In 

 the third place, since all agree that plants are intimately 

 adapted to the conditions in which they live, it is violence to 

 suppose that the very adaptations which are directly produced 

 by those conditions are without permanent effect. In the 

 fourth place, we know as a matter of common knowledge and 

 also of direct experiment, that acquired characters in plants 

 often are perpetuated. 



I cannot hope to prove to the Weismannians that acquired 

 characters may be hereditary, for their definition of an acquired 



