ught to be now
absolutely or nearly superfluous from the necessarily continuous absence of
certain gemmules through so many centuries and so many generations. Yet it
is not at all so, and this fact seems to amount almost to an experimental
demonstration that the hypothesis of pangenesis is an insufficient
explanation of individual evolution.

Two exceedingly good criticisms of Mr. Darwin's hypothesis have appeared.
One of these is by Mr. G. H. Lewes,[221] the other by Professor Delpino of
Florence.[222] The latter gentleman gives a report of an observation made
by him upon a certain plant, which observation adds force to what has just
been said about the Jewish race. He says:[223] "If we examine and compare
the numerous species of the genus _Salvia_, commencing with _Salvia
officinalis_, which may pass as the main state of the genus, and {213}
concluding with _Salvia verticillata_, which may be taken as the most
highly developed form, and as the most distant from the type, we observe a
singular phenomenon. The lower cell of each of the two fertile anthers,
which is much reduced and different from the superior even in _Salvia
officinalis_, is transmuted in other _salviae_ into an organ (nectarotheca)
having a very different form and function, and finally disappears entirely
in _Salvia verticillata_.

"Now, on one occasion, in a flower belonging to an individual of _Salvia
verticillata_, and only on the left stamen, I observed a perfectly
developed and pollinigerous lower cell, perfectly homologous with that
which is normally developed in _Salvia officinalis_. This case of atavism
is truly singular. According to the theory of Pangenesis, it is necessary
to assume that all the gemmules of this anomalous formation, and therefore
the mother-gemmule of the cell, and the daughter-gemmules of the special
epidermic tissue, and of the very singular subjacent tissue of the
endothecium, have been perpetuated, and transmitted from parent to
offspring in a dormant state, and through a number of generations, such as
startles the imagination, and leads it to refuse its consent to the theory
of Pangenesis, however seductive it may be." This seems a strong
confirmation of what has been here advanced.

The main objection raised against Mr. Darwin's hypothesis is that it
(Pangenesis) requires so many subordinate hypotheses for its support, and
that some of these are not tenable.

Professor Delpino considers[224] that as many as eig