The subject of inheritance is wonderful. When a new character arises, whatever its nature may be, it generally tends to be inherited, at least in a temporary and sometimes in a most persistent manner. What can be more wonderful than that some trifling peculiarity, not primordially attached to the species, should be transmitted through the male or female sexual cells, which are so minute as not to be visible to the naked eye, and afterward through the incessant changes of a long course of development, undergone either in the womb or in the egg, and ultimately appear in the offspring when mature, or even when quite old, as in the case of certain diseases? Or, again, what can be more wonderful than the well-ascertained fact that the minute ovule of a good milking-cow will produce a male, from whom a cell, in union with an ovule, will produce a female, and she, when mature, will have large mammary glands, yielding an abundant supply of milk, and even milk of a particular quality? Nevertheless, the real subject of surprise is, as Sir H. Holland has well remarked, not that a character should be inherited, but that any should ever fail to be inherited. LAWS OF INHERITANCE THAT ARE FAIRLY WELL ESTABLISHED. [Animals and Plants, vol. ii, page 61.] Though much remains obscure with respect to inheritance, we may look at the following laws as fairly well established: Firstly, a tendency in every character, new and old, to be transmitted by seminal and bud generation, though often counteracted by various known and unknown causes. Secondly, reversion or atavism, which depends on transmission and development being distinct powers: it acts in various degrees and manners through both seminal and bud generation. Thirdly, prepotency of transmission, which may be confined to one sex, or be common to both sexes. Fourthly, transmission, as limited by sex, generally to the same sex in which the inherited character first appeared; and this in many, probably most cases, depends on the new character having first appeared at a rather late period of life. Fifthly, inheritance at corresponding periods of life, with some tendency to the earlier development of the inherited character. In these laws of inheritance, as displayed under domestication, we see an ample provision for the production, through variability and natural selection, of new specific forms. INHERITED PECULIARITIES IN MAN. [Animals and Plants, vol. i, page 450.]