Origin of Species Variorum

→ hybrids! 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

hybrids! How simply is this fact explained if we believe that these species are all descended from a striped progenitor, in the same manner as the several domestic breeds of the pigeon are descended from the blue and barred rock-pigeon! 1872

→ pigeon have 1859 1860 1861 1866

the pigeon are 1869

→ supposed to have been created independently, have 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

possess 1872

→ the species of the genus have 1859 1860 1861 1866 1869

possessed 1872

conclusion

clusion

when we look, for instance, at the logger-headed duck, which has wings incapable of flight, in nearly the same condition as in the domestic duck; or when we look at the burrowing

tucu-tucu,

tucutucu,

which is occasionally blind, and then at certain moles, which are habitually blind and have their eyes covered with skin; or when we look at the blind animals inhabiting the dark caves of America and Europe.

With

In both

varieties and

species,

correlated

variation

seems to have played

important part, so that when one part has been modified other parts

have been

are

necessarily modified.

With

both varieties and

species,

species

reversions to long-lost characters

occasionally occur.

occur.

How inexplicable on the theory of creation is the

variable

occasional

appearance of stripes on the

shoulders

shoulder

and legs of the several species of the horse-genus and

their →hybrids! How simply is this fact explained if we believe that these species

are all

have

all descended

descended

from a striped progenitor, in the same manner as the several domestic breeds of →pigeon have descended from the blue and barred rock-pigeon!

On the ordinary view of each species having been independently created, why should

~~the~~

the

specific

charac- ters,

characters,

or those by which the species of the same genus differ from each other, be more variable than

~~the~~

the

generic characters in which they all agree? Why, for instance, should the colour of a flower be more likely to vary in any one species of a genus, if the other

species

species,

→supposed to have been created independently, have differently coloured flowers, than if all →the species of the genus have the same coloured flowers? If species are only well-marked varieties, of which the characters have become in a high degree permanent, we can understand this fact; for they have already varied since they branched off from a common progenitor in certain characters, by which they have come to be specifically distinct from each other;