397 
modification. It should, further, be observed that the 
modification inaugurated in this way is continued, so 
that in a few generations there has taken place a change 
which, in some cases, amounts to a transmutation of 
species. 
“ Mr. Winwood Reade, in speaking of the different animals and 
plants introduced into West Africa, speaks of a marked change in 
all:— 4 The horse rapidly deteriorates, and in some places cannot be 
kept alive at all. The sheep change in other respects than their 
wool. The very dogs which we should expect to bear the change as 
well as their masters, alter under the baleful climate.’ 4 In process of 
time,’ writes Bosman, 4 our dogs alter strangely here : their ears grow 
long and stiff, like those of foxes, to which colour they also incline, so 
that in three or four years they degenerate into very ugly creatures ; 
and in three or four broods their barking turns into a howl.’ As to 
plants, Mr. Reade says, 4 it is only on the borders of malarious 
Africa—that is to say, in Angola and Senegambia—that most foreign 
plants and vegetables can be made to live; and these, as Mr. Gabriel, 
of Loanda, informed me, completely changed their nature when 
planted in the African soil.’”—(Andrew Murray. The Geographical 
Distribution of Mammals, p. 8.) 
44 The effects of the climate of Europe on the American varieties (of 
maize) is highly remarkable. Metzger obtained seed from various 
parts of America, and cultivated several kinds in Germany. I will give 
an abstract of the changes observed in one case, namely, with a tall 
kind (Breit-korniger mays, Zea altissima) brought from the warmer 
parts of America. During the first year the plants were twelve 
feet high, and few seeds were perfected ; the lower seeds in the 
ear kept true to their proper form, but the upper seeds became 
slightly changed. In the second generation the plants were from 
nine to ten feet in height, and ripened their seed better; the de 
pression on the outer side of the seed had almost disappeared, and 
the original beautiful white colour had become duskier. Some of the 
seeds had even become yellow, and in their now rounded form they 
approached common European maize. In the third generation nearly 
all resemblance to the original and very distinct American parent- 
form was lost. In the sixth generation this maize perfectly resembled 
a European variety, described as the second sub-variety of the fifth 
race. When Metzer published his book this variety was still culti 
vated near Heidelberg, and could be distinguished from the common 
kind only by a somewhat more vigorous growth. Analogous results 
were obtained by the cultivation of another American race, the 4 white-