ore we pass on
to the corresponding experiments in plants. Professor Alfred Newton
received from a friend a pair of hybrid ducks, bred from a common duck
(Anas boschas), and a pintail (Dafila acuta). From these he obtained
four ducklings, but these latter, when grown up, proved infertile, and
did not breed again. In this case we have the results of close
interbreeding, with too great a difference between the original species,
combining to produce infertility, yet the fact of a hybrid from such a
pair producing healthy offspring is itself noteworthy.

Still more extraordinary is the following statement of Mr. Low: "It has
been long known to shepherds, though questioned by naturalists, that the
progeny of the cross between the sheep and goat is fertile. Breeds of
this mixed race are numerous in the north of Europe."[55] Nothing
appears to be known of such hybrids either in Scandinavia or in Italy;
but Professor Giglioli of Florence has kindly given me some useful
references to works in which they are described. The following extract
from his letter is very interesting: "I need not tell you that there
being such hybrids is now generally accepted as a fact. Buffon
(_Supplements_, tom. iii. p. 7, 1756) obtained one such hybrid in 1751
and eight in 1752. Sanson (_La Culture_, vol. vi. p. 372, 1865) mentions
a case observed in the Vosges, France. Geoff. St. Hilaire (_Hist. Nat.
Gen. des reg. org._, vol. iii. p. 163) was the first to mention, I
believe, that in different parts of South America the ram is more
usually crossed with the she-goat than the sheep with the he-goat. The
well-known 'pellones' of Chile are produced by the second and third
generation of such hybrids (Gay, 'Hist, de Chile,' vol. i. p. 466,
_Agriculture_, 1862). Hybrids bred from goat and sheep are called
'chabin' in French, and 'cabruno' in Spanish. In Chile such hybrids are
called 'carneros lanudos'; their breeding _inter se_ appears to be not
always successful, and often the original cross has to be recommenced to
obtain the proportion of three-eighths of he-goat and five-eighths of
sheep, or of three-eighths of ram and five-eighths of she-goat; such
being the reputed best hybrids."

With these numerous facts recorded by competent observers we can hardly
doubt that races of hybrids between these very distinct species have
been produced, and that such hybrids are fairly fertile _inter se_; and
the analogous facts already given lead us to believe that wha