WCP564

[1]

Wykeham House.

Oxford.

Oct[ober]. 22/ 1893

My dear Wallace,

Many thanks for the maps. I am having them coloured by hand & Shall then frame them & distribute them about the room.

I quite intend to spend a great deal on a complete collection illustrating mimicry. Luckily we have already a lot of splendid things in the [2] general collections, & from these I can take the duplicates & make[?] incorporate in the mimicry collection.

Yesterday we found lots of splendid mimicks [sic] of Hymenoptera among the beetles. Most of them quite undescribed altho[ugh]' some like the one figured in "Darwinism".

In one, the elytra were of the usual length, but reduced [3] [1 word illeg.] almost to threads. They were all longicorns allied to Clytus our own genus which also mimicks[sic] wasps but far less perfectly (you remember I shared you drawing of one).

Some of these had magnificent hairy orange & black legs just like some Bombus or other bee.

I shall thy to find the species they mimick[sic] in [4] our coll[ectio]ⁿ of Hymenoptera.

No, I was not at Nottingham. he here ^{must be} so try next year when B.Aⁿ comes here that I took a holiday, having been a regular attend for many years.

The evidence for any conclusion must be strong in proportion to the inherent improbability of the conclusion — so I think. And thus honeymoons ^{assumed result} of maternal impression seems to be to be essentially importable [5] from many considerations.

1) The parts of the foetus are formed so early & the impression is usually so late in pregnancy that the amputated or removed foetal limb ought to be found. Jacob's ^supposed a experiment on the sheep in genesis, indicated took a more probable line (tho[ugh]' I think a very improbable one) in making the impression at copulation.

2). On the whole the ^original influence of father & mother are equal. But if the mother can in addition cause dual effects [6] from marked impressions, is it not likely that all impressions will produce some effect & that the mammalian offspring will be on the whole and the average, but nearer the mother than father?

or at any

3). Walter Heape¹ has caused the foetal development to of one Rabbit to take place in the uterus of another of different breed & habits, but by transplanting the impregnated [7] ovum. No effect of any kind was produced, the offspring being entirely normal.

4). By extra-uterine foetation sometimes occurring in the human & pursuing a normal course, seems to indicate the true view to be one wh[ich]: recognizes that the foetus is a parasite & all hereditary influence to have been due to the original germ. The parasitic being only affected afterwards, by the quality [8] be[?] of the blood, as it cant be in later in life of that of its food.

5.) It is very difficult to believe that heredity is [illeg.] subject to different laws in the oviparous animals, as compared with viviparous. All these considerations seem to me to demand that the evidence shall be very abundant & complete, that the the tending has be for it to diminish as Doctors have been better trained in science. [9] I have sifted evidence better. Now very few of the younger more scientific doctors believe it. Formerly all realized it.

I am now struggling hard to get more space & more appliances & more funds. That everything here has to go thro[ugh]' so many committees it is hard to progress rapidly.

With kind regards & thanks| Yours sincerely | EB Poulton [signature]