Darwinism stated by Darwin himself · Charles Darwin
FUNCTIONAL INDEPENDENCE OF THE UNITS OF THE BODY.
Many facts support this view of the independent life of each minute element of the body. Virchow insists that a single bone-corpuscle or a single cell in the skin may become diseased. The spur of a cock, after being inserted into the ear of an ox, lived for eight years, and acquired a weight of three hundred and ninety-six grammes (nearly fourteen ounces) and the astonishing length of twenty-four centimetres, or about nine inches; so that the head of the ox appeared to bear three horns. The tail of a pig has been grafted into the middle of its back, and reacquired sensibility. Dr. Ollier inserted a piece of periosteum from the bone of a young dog under the skin of a rabbit, and true bone was developed. A multitude of similar facts could be given. * * * * * [Page 368.] What can be more wonderful than that characters, which have disappeared during scores, or hundreds, or even thousands of generations, should suddenly reappear perfectly developed, as in the case of pigeons and fowls, both when purely bred and especially when crossed; or as with the zebrine stripes on dun-colored horses, and other such cases? Many monstrosities come under this same head, as when rudimentary organs are redeveloped, or when an organ which we must believe was possessed by an early progenitor of the species, but of which not even a rudiment is left, suddenly reappears, as with the fifth stamen in some _Scrophulariaceæ_.
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