50 JOURNAL OF THE ROYAL HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



many more individuals are born than can possibly survive) that 

 individuals having any advantage, however slight, over others, 

 would have the best chance of surviving ? On the other hand, we 

 may feel sure that any variation in the least degree injurious would 

 be rigidly destroyed. This preservation of favourable individual 

 differences and variations, and the destruction of those which are 

 injurious, I have called Natural Selection." * 



I have italicized the expression, upon the truth of which the theory 

 stands or falls ; for by " injurious " we learn elsewhere that he means 

 " inadaptive." I say, at once, no instance is known among seedlings of 

 any injurious variations of structure arising. For all variations take 

 place between germination and the adult stage of seed-bearing. 



The Origin of Variations. — Why do new structural variations ever 

 arise at all ? The following is Darwin's statement of their cause, 

 which Prof. Bateson hesitates to accept : " The direct action of the 

 [changed] conditions of life, whether leading to definite [i.e. adaptive] 

 or indefinite [i.e. inadaptive] results, is a totally distinct consideration 

 from the effects of natural selection ; for natural selection depends 

 on the survival under various and complex circumstances of the best- 

 fitted individuals ; but it has no relation whatever to the primary 

 cause of any^modification of structure." | 



" By the term definite action, I mean an action of such a nature 

 that, when many individuals of the same variety are exposed to any 

 change in their physical conditions of life, all, or nearly all the indi- 

 viduals, are modified in the same' manner. A new sub-variety would 

 thus be produced without the aid of selection." % 



It could not be stated plainer that the " cause " of variations is 

 the direct action of changed conditions of life ; and that " natural 

 selection " stands, theoretically, for what Prof. Bateson calls the 

 " delimitation " of varieties and species. 



The title of Darwin's book is, therefore, misleading ; for it has 

 induced some writers § to regard natural selection as the actual cause 

 of new species. The word " origin " should mean " origination " ; 

 but with this natural selection has nothing in common. 



The starting-point of Evolution resides in the inherent variability || 

 of animals and plants, i.e. the power or ability to vary, while the 

 cultivation of plants and the domestication of animals have shown 

 this to be true in various degrees ; as some plants and animals, such as 

 wheat and horses, &c, have produced numerous varieties ; whereas 

 others have given rise to a few or none, as the ass and goose, the 

 raspberry and currant, the stock and wallflower. 



When we turn to Nature, we do not find this profusion of indefinite 

 variations springing up about the parent plants, as in the plant-beds 

 of nurseries. 



* Origin &c. 6th ed. p. 63. 

 \ Variation &c. ii. p. 272. 

 X Op. ext. ii. p. 271. 

 § Op. cit. ii. p. 272. 



|| Darwin often uses the word " variability " to mean " variations." 



