mal from its wild to its domesticated state. I do not
see anything very wonderful in the fact, if it took all that trouble to
get it from a wild state, that it should go back into its original state
as soon as you removed the conditions which produced the variation to
the domesticated form. There is an important fact, however, forcibly
brought forward by Mr. Darwin, which has been noticed in connection with
the breeding of domesticated pigeons; and it is, that however different
these breeds of pigeons may be from each other, and we have already
noticed the great differences in these breeds, that if, among any of
those variations, you chance to have a blue pigeon turn up, it will be
sure to have the black bars across the wings, which are characteristic
of the original wild stock, the Rock Pigeon.

Now, this is certainly a very remarkable circumstance; but I do not see
myself how it tells very strongly either one way or the other. I think,
in fact, that this argument in favour of recurrence to the primitive
type might prove a great deal too much for those who so constantly
bring it forward. For example, Mr. Darwin has very forcibly urged,
that nothing is commoner than if you examine a dun horse--and I had an
opportunity of verifying this illustration lately, while in the islands
of the West Highlands, where there are a great many dun horses--to find
that horse exhibit a long black stripe down his back, very often stripes
on his shoulder, and very often stripes on his legs. I, myself, saw
a pony of this description a short time ago, in a baker's cart, near
Rothesay, in Bute: it had the long stripe down the back, and stripes on
the shoulders and legs, just like those of the Ass, the Quagga, and the
Zebra. Now, if we interpret the theory of recurrence as applied to
this case, might it not be said that here was a case of a variation
exhibiting the characters and conditions of an animal occupying
something like an intermediate position between the Horse, the Ass, the
Quagga, and the Zebra, and from which these had been developed? In the
same way with regard even to Man. Every anatomist will tell you that
there is nothing commoner, in dissecting the human body, than to meet
with what are called muscular variations--that is, if you dissect
two bodies very carefully, you will probably find that the modes of
attachment and insertion of the muscles are not exactly the same in
both, there being great peculiarities in the mode in whic