THE 
NEW PHYTOIiOGIST. 
Vol. i., No. 9. 
November 28th, 1902. 
MENDEL’S LAWS AND THEIR PROBABLE RELATIONS 
TO INTRA-RACIAL HEREDITY. 
By G. Udny Yule. 
,HE two volumes 1 that are the immediate occasion of these 
articles have more in common, besides their authorship, than 
appears from their respective titles; both deal solely with Mendel’s 
Laws of Hybridisation, to which so much attention has been 
recently directed. The “ Report to the Evolution Committee” of the 
Royal Society contains an account of experiments, begun appar¬ 
ently with other objects, but continued with a view of further 
testing the scope and validity of the laws. These experiments 
include crosses between species or varieties of Lychnis , Atropa , 
Datura and Matthiola , together with some observations on poultry. 
Generally speaking the results are in accordance with Mendel’s 
rules, although Mr. Bateson and Miss Saunders, like other ob¬ 
servers, found some difficulties and exceptions, notably in the case 
of the Matthiola hybrids and in the experiments with poultry. The 
Report on these experiments is preceded by a short account of the 
work of Mendel himself, and that of Correns, De Vries, and 
Tschermak, and is followed by some forty pages on “ The Facts of 
Heredity in the light of Mendel’s discovery.” The second volume 
on “ Mendel’s Principles of Heredity” consists of two parts, the 
first containing a translation of Mendel’s papers, with an introduc¬ 
tion ; the second, with the sub-title “ A Defence of Mendel’s 
Principles of Heredity,” being a reply to Professor Weldon’s 
article “ On Mendel’s Laws of Alternative Inheritance in Peas,” 
which appeared in the January number of “ Biometrika.” 
1 (1) Royal Society. Reports to the Evolution Committee. Report 
I. Experiments undertaken by W. Bateson, F.R.S., and 
Miss E. R. Saunders. 1902. 
(2) Mendel’s Principles of Heredity: a Defence; by W. Bateson, 
E.R.S. Cambridge: at the University Press, 1902. 
