Darwin From Insectivorous Plants To Worms - Variation Revised

Variation Revised

Now Darwin turned to work on a new edition of The Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication incorporating additions from the hundreds of letters and scores of monographs that had been sent to Darwin in the seven years since it had been published. Parts were altered or discarded, and George Romanes set aside work on jellyfish to graft vegetable plants in experiments aimed at finding out about the "gemmules" which Darwin thought formed the mechanism of inheritance of characteristics. Investigations into "pangenesis" by Galton had tried blood transfusions between different breeds of rabbits without success. Darwin continued to look for proof of inheritance of acquired characteristics, amassing evidence of blacksmith's children being muscular and babies born with scars matching those of their parents. He would not follow Huxley in discarding these ideas, and Descent had presented such inheritance as a significant factor in human evolution.

Darwin had long been concerned that his children could have inherited his weaknesses. He was proud that Frank seemed to have inherited his interest in natural history, coming to Down House from the village to carry out plant experiments, and put his son up for a Fellowship of the Linnean Society.