HEREDITARY INFLUENCE. 713 
or half of an Italian bandit, and the other half of a good 
peaceful shopkeeper. 
It is now time that we should direct our attention to some 
of the perturbing causes which mask the laws of trans- 
mission from our perfect apprehension. While proclaiming 
as absolute the law of individual transmission, while pro- 
claiming that the parents are always reproduced in the 
offspring, we are met by the obvious fact of the offspring 
often exhibiting so marked a departure from their parents, 
being so different in form and disposition, that the law seems 
at fault. For instance, Gall speaks of a breed of wolf-cubs 
taken from their mother and brought up together ; one was 
as gentle as a dog, the others retained the savageness of their 
species. We may also point to the fact of a man of genius 
suddenly starting up in an ordinary family ; or to a thousand 
illustrative examples in which the law of individual trans- 
mission seems at fault. To explain these would be to have 
mastered the whole mystery of heritage ; all that we can do 
is to mention some of the known perturbing influences. 
Sir Everard Home mentions a striking case, which has 
become celebrated, of a thorough-bred English mare, who, 
in the year 1816, had a mule by a quagga — the mule bearing 
the umistakable quagga marks. In the years 1817, 1818, 
and 1823, this mare again foaled, and although she had not 
seen the quagga since 1816, her three foals were all marked 
with the curious quagga marks. Nor is this by any means an 
isolated case. Meckel observed similar results in the cross- 
ing of a wild boar with a domestic sow ; in the first litter 
several had the brown bristles of the father ; and in each of 
the sow’s subsequent litters by domestic boars, some of the 
young ones were easily distinguished by their resemblance 
to the wild boar. Mr. Orton verified this fact in the cases 
of dogs, pigs, and poultry. Of the latter he says : <tf The so 
called silk fowls have certain marked peculiarities — a silky, 
or downy plumage, a black skin and face, black bill and 
mouth, black legs, and dark or even black bones ; they have, 
moreover, a fully developed tuft on the head, five toes, and 
are feathered on the legs and feet.” Peculiarities such as 
these were invaluable for the experiment. He found the 
produce of a silk cock with a common white hen to be 
“ twelve or fifteen chickens, the whole of which had the 
black skin, black mouth, and five toes of the silk cock — his 
external development. As to their plumage, I could only 
judge in the case of four, the rest having died in the downy 
state. Of these four, then, they have all the black skin and 
xxix. 91 
