Charles Darwin

The Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication Charles Darwin

The great principle of inheritance to be discussed in this chapter has been recognised by agriculturists and authors of various nations, as shown by the scientific term ATAVISM, derived from atavus, an ancestor; by the English terms of REVERSION, or THROWING-BACK; by the French PAS-EN-ARRIERE; and by the German RUCKSCHLAG, or RUCKSCHRITT. When the child resembles either grandparent more closely than its immediate parents, our attention is not much arrested, though in truth the fact is highly remarkable; but when the child resembles some remote ancestor or some distant member in a collateral line, -and in the last case we must attribute this to the descent of all the members from a common progenitor, -we feel a just degree of astonishment. When one parent alone displays some newly-acquired and generally inheritable character, and the offspring do not inherit it, the cause may lie in the other parent having the power of prepotent transmissi