Those individuals in which a tendency to vary occurred being no longer cut off, they would have as good a chance of leaving progeny to inherit their fluctuating disposition as would their more inflexible companions.
LETTER 264.

TO G.J.ROMANES.

July 16th, 1874.
I am much obliged for your kind and long communication, which I have read with great interest, as well as your articles in "Nature." The subject seems to me as important and interesting as it is difficult.
I am much out of health, and working very hard on a very different subject, so thus I cannot give your remarks the attention which they deserve.

I will, however, keep your letter for some later time, when I may again take up the subject.

Your letter makes it clearer to me than it ever was before, how a part or organ which has already begun from any cause to decrease, will go on decreasing through so-called spontaneous variability, with intercrossing; for under such circumstances it is very unlikely that there should be variation in the direction of increase beyond the average size, and no reason why there should not be variations of decrease.