Darwin and Modern Science Part 18

In spite of their high development in past ages the Lycopods, recent and fossil, const.i.tute, on the whole, a h.o.m.ogeneous group, and there is little at present to connect them with other phyla. Anatomically some relation to the Sphenophylls is indicated, and perhaps the recent Psilotaceae give some support to this connection, for while their nearest alliance appears to be with the Sphenophylls, they approach the Lycopods in anatomy, habit, and mode of branching.

The typically microphyllous character of the Lycopods, and the simple relation between sporangium and sporophyll which obtains throughout the cla.s.s, have led various botanists to regard them as the most primitive phylum of the Vascular Cryptogams. There is nothing in the fossil record to disprove this view, but neither is there anything to support it, for this cla.s.s so far as we know is no more ancient than the megaphyllous Cryptogams, and its earliest representatives show no special simplicity.

If the indications of affinity with Sphenophylls are of any value the Lycopods are open to suspicion of reduction from a megaphyllous ancestry, but there is no direct palaeontological evidence for such a history.

The general conclusions to which we are led by a consideration of the fossil record of the Vascular Cryptogams are still very hypothetical, but may be provisionally stated as follows:

The Ferns go back to the earliest known period. In Mesozoic times practically all the existing families had appeared; in the Palaeozoic the cla.s.s was less extensive than formerly believed, a majority of the supposed Ferns of that age having proved to be seed-bearing plants. The oldest authentic representatives of the Ferns were megaphyllous plants, broadly speaking, of the same type as those of later epochs, though differing much in detail. As far back as the record extends they show no sign of becoming merged with other phyla in any synthetic group.

The Equisetales likewise have a long history, and manifestly attained their greatest development in Palaeozoic times. Their oldest forms show an approach to the extinct cla.s.s Sphenophyllales, which connects them to some extent, by anatomical characters, with the Lycopods. At the same time the oldest Equisetales show a somewhat megaphyllous character, which was more marked in the Devonian Pseudoborniales. Some remote affinity with the Ferns (which has also been upheld on other grounds) may thus be indicated. It is possible that in the Sphenophyllales we may have the much-modified representatives of a very ancient synthetic group.

The Lycopods likewise attained their maximum in the Palaeozoic, and show, on the whole, a greater elaboration of structure in their early forms than at any later period, while at the same time maintaining a considerable degree of uniformity in morphological characters throughout their history. The Sphenophyllales are the only other cla.s.s with which they show any relation; if such a connection existed, the common point of origin must lie exceedingly far back.

The fossil record, as at present known, cannot, in the nature of things, throw any direct light on what is perhaps the most disputed question in the morphology of plants--the origin of the alternating generations of the higher Cryptogams and the Spermophyta. At the earliest period to which terrestrial plants have been traced back all the groups of Vascular Cryptogams were in a highly advanced stage of evolution, while innumerable Seed-plants--presumably the descendants of Cryptogamic ancestors--were already flouris.h.i.+ng. On the other hand we know practically nothing of Palaeozoic Bryophyta, and the evidence even for their existence at that period cannot be termed conclusive. While there are thus no palaeontological grounds for the hypothesis that the Vascular plants came of a Bryophytic stock, the question of their actual origin remains unsolved.

III. NATURAL SELECTION.

Hitherto we have considered the palaeontological record of plants in relation to Evolution. The question remains, whether the record throws any light on the theory of which Darwin and Wallace were the authors--that of Natural Selection. The subject is clearly one which must be investigated by other methods than those of the palaeontologist; still there are certain important points involved, on which the palaeontological record appears to bear.

One of these points is the supposed distinction between morphological and adaptive characters, on which Nageli, in particular, laid so much stress. The question is a difficult one; it was discussed by Darwin ("Origin of Species" (6th edition), pages 170-176.), who, while showing that the apparent distinction is in part to be explained by our imperfect knowledge of function, recognised the existence of important morphological characters which are not adaptations. The following pa.s.sage expresses his conclusion. "Thus, as I am inclined to believe, morphological differences, which we consider as important--such as the arrangement of the leaves, the divisions of the flower or of the ovarium, the position of the ovules, etc.--first appeared in many cases as fluctuating variations, which sooner or later became constant through the nature of the organism and of the surrounding conditions, as well as through the inter-crossing of distinct individuals, but not through natural selection; for as these morphological characters do not affect the welfare of the species, any slight deviations in them could not have been governed or acc.u.mulated through this latter agency." (Ibid. page 176.)

This is a sufficiently liberal concession; Nageli, however, went much further when he said: "I do not know among plants a morphological modification which can be explained on utilitarian principles." (See "More Letters", Vol. II. page 375 (footnote).) If this were true the field of Natural Selection would be so seriously restricted, as to leave the theory only a very limited importance.

It can be shown, as the writer believes, that many typical "morphological characters," on which the distinction between great cla.s.ses of plants is based, were adaptive in origin, and even that their constancy is due to their functional importance. Only one or two cases will be mentioned, where the fossil evidence affects the question.

The pollen-tube is one of the most important morphological characters of the Spermophyta as now existing--in fact the name Siphonogama is used by Engler in his cla.s.sification, as expressing a peculiarly constant character of the Seed-plants. Yet the pollen-tube is a manifest adaptation, following on the adoption of the seed-habit, and serving first to bring the spermatozoids with greater precision to their goal, and ultimately to relieve them of the necessity for independent movement. The pollen-tube is constant because it has proved to be indispensable.

In the Palaeozoic Seed-plants there are a number of instances in which the pollen-grains, contained in the pollen-chamber of a seed, are so beautifully preserved that the presence of a group of cells within the grain can be demonstrated; sometimes we can even see how the cell-walls broke down to emit the sperms, and quite lately it is said that the sperms themselves have been recognised. (F.W. Oliver, "On Physostoma elegans, an archaic type of seed from the Palaeozoic Rocks", "Annals of Botany", January, 1909. See also the earlier papers there cited.) In no case, however, is there as yet any satisfactory evidence for the formation of a pollen-tube; it is probable that in these early Seed-plants the pollen-grains remained at about the evolutionary level of the microspores in Pilularia or Selaginella, and discharged their spermatozoids directly, leaving them to find their own way to the female cells. It thus appears that there were once Spermophyta without pollen-tubes. The pollen-tube method ultimately prevailed, becoming a constant "morphological character," for no other reason than because, under the new conditions, it provided a more perfect mechanism for the accomplishment of the act of fertilisation. We have still, in the Cycads and Ginkgo, the transitional case, where the tube remains short, serves mainly as an anchor and water-reservoir, but yet is able, by its slight growth, to give the spermatozoids a "lift" in the right direction. In other Seed-plants the sperms are mere pa.s.sengers, carried all the way by the pollen-tube; this fact has alone rendered the Angiospermous method of fertilisation through a stigma possible.

We may next take the seed itself--the very type of a morphological character. Our fossil record does not go far enough back to tell us the origin of the seed in the Cycadophyta and Pteridosperms (the main line of its development) but some interesting sidelights may be obtained from the Lycopod phylum. In two Palaeozoic genera, as we have seen, seed-like organs are known to have been developed, resembling true seeds in the presence of an integument and of a single functional embryo-sac, as well as in some other points. We will call these organs "seeds" for the sake of shortness. In one genus (Lepidocarpon) the seeds were borne on a cone indistinguishable from that of the ordinary cryptogamic Lepidodendreae, the typical Lycopods of the period, while the seed itself retained much of the detailed structure of the sporangium of that family. In the second genus, Miadesmia, the seed-bearing plant was herbaceous, and much like a recent Selaginella. (See Margaret Benson, "Miadesmia membranacea, a new Palaeozoic Lycopod with a seed-like structure", "Phil. Trans.

Royal Soc. Vol." 199, B. 1908.) The seeds of the two genera are differently constructed, and evidently had an independent origin. Here, then, we have seeds arising casually, as it were, at different points among plants which otherwise retain all the characters of their cryptogamic fellows; the seed is not yet a morphological character of importance. To suppose that in these isolated cases the seed sprang into being in obedience to a Law of Advance ("Vervollkommungsprincip"), from which other contemporary Lycopods were exempt, involves us in unnecessary mysticism. On the other hand it is not difficult to see how these seeds may have arisen, as adaptive structures, under the influence of Natural Selection. The seed-like structure afforded protection to the prothallus, and may have enabled the embryo to be launched on the world in greater security. There was further, as we may suppose, a gain in certainty of fertilisation. As the writer has pointed out elsewhere, the chances against the necessary a.s.sociation of the small male with the large female spores must have been enormously great when the cones were borne high up on tall trees. The same difficulty may have existed in the case of the herbaceous Miadesmia, if, as Miss Benson conjectures, it was an epiphyte. One way of solving the problem was for pollination to take place while the megaspore was still on the parent plant, and this is just what the formation of an ovule or seed was likely to secure.

The seeds of the Pteridosperms, unlike those of the Lycopod stock, have not yet been found in statu nascendi--in all known cases they were already highly developed organs and far removed from the cryptogamic sporangium. But in two respects we find that these seeds, or some of them, had not yet realised their possibilities. In the seed of Lyginodendron and other cases the micropyle, or orifice of the integument, was not the pa.s.sage through which the pollen entered; the open neck of the pollen-chamber protruded through the micropyle and itself received the pollen. We have met with an a.n.a.logous case, at a more advanced stage of evolution, in the Bennett.i.teae, where the wall of the gynaecium, though otherwise closed, did not provide a stigma to catch the pollen, but allowed the micropyles of the ovules to protrude and receive the pollen in the old gymnospermous fas.h.i.+on. The integument in the one case and the pistil in the other had not yet a.s.sumed all the functions to which the organ ultimately became adapted. Again, no Palaeozoic seed has yet been found to contain an embryo, though the preservation is often good enough for it to have been recognised if present. It is probable that the nursing of the embryo had not yet come to be one of the functions of the seed, and that the whole embryonic development was relegated to the germination stage.

In these two points, the reception of the pollen by the micropyle and the nursing of the embryo, it appears that many Palaeozoic seeds were imperfect, as compared with the typical seeds of later times.

As evolution went on, one function was superadded on another, and it appears impossible to resist the conclusion that the whole differentiation of the seed was a process of adaptation, and consequently governed by Natural Selection, just as much as the specialisation of the rostellum in an Orchid, or of the pappus in a Composite.

Did s.p.a.ce allow, other examples might be added. We may venture to maintain that the glimpses which the fossil record allows us into early stages in the evolution of organs now of high systematic importance, by no means justify the belief in any essential distinction between morphological and adaptive characters.

Another point, closely connected with Darwin's theory, on which the fossil history of plants has been supposed to have some bearing, is the question of Mutation, as opposed to indefinite variation. Arber and Parkin, in their interesting memoir on the Origin of Angiosperms, have suggested calling in Mutation to explain the apparently sudden transition from the cycadean to the angiospermous type of foliage, in late Mesozoic times, though they express themselves with much caution, and point out "a distinct danger that Mutation may become the last resort of the phylogenetically dest.i.tute"!

The distinguished French palaeobotanists, Grand'Eury (C. Grand'Eury, "Sur les mutations de quelques Plantes fossiles du Terrain houiller".

"Comptes Rendus", CXLII. page 25, 1906.) and Zeiller (R. Zeiller "Les Vegetaux fossiles et leurs Enchainements", "Revue du Mois", III.

February, 1907.), are of opinion, to quote the words of the latter writer, that the facts of fossil Botany are in agreement with the sudden appearance of new forms, differing by marked characters from those that have given them birth; he adds that these results give more amplitude to this idea of Mutation, extending it to groups of a higher order, and even revealing the existence of discontinuous series between the successive terms of which we yet recognise bonds of filiation. (Loc.

cit. page 23.)

If Zeiller's opinion should be confirmed, it would no doubt be a serious blow to the Darwinian theory. As Darwin said: "Under a scientific point of view, and as leading to further investigation, but little advantage is gained by believing that new forms are suddenly developed in an inexplicable manner from old and widely different forms, over the old belief in the creation of species from the dust of the earth." ("Origin of Species", page 424.)

It most however be pointed out, that such mutations as Zeiller, and to some extent Arber and Parkin, appear to have in view, bridging the gulf between different Orders and Cla.s.ses, bear no relation to any mutations which have been actually observed, such as the comparatively small changes, of sub-specific value, described by De Vries in the type-case of Oenothera Lamarckiana. The results of palaeobotanical research have undoubtedly tended to fill up gaps in the Natural System of plants--that many such gaps still persist is not surprising; their presence may well serve as an incentive to further research but does not, as it seems to the writer, justify the a.s.sumption of changes in the past, wholly without a.n.a.logy among living organisms.

As regards the succession of species, there are no greater authorities than Grand'Eury and Zeiller, and great weight must be attached to their opinion that the evidence from continuous deposits favours a somewhat sudden change from one specific form to another. At the same time it will be well to bear in mind that the subject of the "absence of numerous intermediate varieties in any single formation" was fully discussed by Darwin. ("Origin of Species", pages 275-282, and page 312.); the explanation which he gave may go a long way to account for the facts which recent writers have regarded as favouring the theory of saltatory mutation.

The rapid sketch given in the present essay can do no more than call attention to a few salient points, in which the palaeontological records of plants has an evident bearing on the Darwinian theory. At the present day the whole subject of palaeobotany is a study in evolution, and derives its chief inspiration from the ideas of Darwin and Wallace. In return it contributes something to the verification of their teaching; the recent progress of the subject, in spite of the immense difficulties which still remain, has added fresh force to Darwin's statement that "the great leading facts in palaeontology agree admirably with the theory of descent with modification through variation and natural selection." (Ibid. page 313.)

XIII. THE INFLUENCE OF ENVIRONMENT ON THE FORMS OF PLANTS. By Georg Klebs, PH.D.

Professor of Botany in the University of Heidelberg.

The dependence of plants on their environment became the object of scientific research when the phenomena of life were first investigated and physiology took its place as a special branch of science. This occurred in the course of the eighteenth century as the result of the pioneer work of Hales, Duhamel, Ingenhousz, Senebier and others. In the nineteenth century, particularly in the second half, physiology experienced an unprecedented development in that it began to concern itself with the experimental study of nutrition and growth, and with the phenomena a.s.sociated with stimulus and movement; on the other hand, physiology neglected phenomena connected with the production of form, a department of knowledge which was the province of morphology, a purely descriptive science. It was in the middle of the last century that the growth of comparative morphology and the study of phases of development reached their highest point.

The forms of plants appeared to be the expression of their inscrutable inner nature; the stages pa.s.sed through in the development of the individual were regarded as the outcome of purely internal and hidden laws. The feasibility of experimental inquiry seemed therefore remote.

Meanwhile, the recognition of the great importance of such a causal morphology emerged from the researches of the physiologists of that time, more especially from those of Hofmeister (Hofmeister, "Allgemeine Morphologie", Leipzig, 1868, page 579.), and afterwards from the work of Sachs. (Sachs, "Stoff und Form der Pflanzenorgane", Vol. I. 1880; Vol.

II. 1882. "Gesammelte Abhandlungen uber Pflanzen-Physiologie", II.

Leipzig, 1893.) Hofmeister, in speaking of this line of inquiry, described it as "the most pressing and immediate aim of the investigator to discover to what extent external forces acting on the organism are of importance in determining its form." This advance was the outcome of the influence of that potent force in biology which was created by Darwin's "Origin of Species" (1859).

The significance of the splendid conception of the transformation of species was first recognised and discussed by Lamarck (1809); as an explanation of transformation he at once seized upon the idea--an intelligible view--that the external world is the determining factor.

Lamarck (Lamarck, "Philosophie zoologique", pages 223-227. Paris, 1809.) endeavoured, more especially, to demonstrate from the behaviour of plants that changes in environment induce change in form which eventually leads to the production of new species. In the case of animals, Lamarck adopted the teleological view that alterations in the environment first lead to alterations in the needs of the organisms, which, as the result of a kind of conscious effort of will, induce useful modifications and even the development of new organs. His work has not exercised any influence on the progress of science: Darwin himself confessed in regard to Lamarck's work--"I got not a fact or idea from it." ("Life and Letters", Vol. II. page 215.)

On a ma.s.s of incomparably richer and more essential data Darwin based his view of the descent of organisms and gained for it general acceptance; as an explanation of modification he elaborated the ingeniously conceived selection theory. The question of special interest in this connection, namely what is the importance of the influence of the environment, Darwin always answered with some hesitation and caution, indeed with a certain amount of indecision.

The fundamental principle underlying his theory is that of general variability as a whole, the nature and extent of which, especially in cultivated organisms, are fully dealt with in his well-known book.

(Darwin, "The variation of Animals and Plants under domestication", 2 vols., edition 1, 1868; edition 2, 1875; popular edition 1905.) In regard to the question as to the cause of variability Darwin adopts a consistently mechanical view. He says: "These several considerations alone render it probable that variability of every kind is directly or indirectly caused by changed conditions of life. Or, to put the case under another point of view, if it were possible to expose all the individuals of a species during many generations to absolutely uniform conditions of life, there would be no variability." ("The variation of Animals and Plants" (2nd edition), Vol. II. page 242.) Darwin did not draw further conclusions from this general principle.

Variations produced in organisms by the environment are distinguished by Darwin as "the definite" and "the indefinite." (Ibid. II. page 260. See also "Origin of Species" (6th edition), page 6.) The first occur "when all or nearly all the offspring of an individual exposed to certain conditions during several generations are modified in the same manner."

Indefinite variation is much more general and a more important factor in the production of new species; as a result of this, single individuals are distinguished from one another by "slight" differences, first in one then in another character. There may also occur, though this is very rare, more marked modifications, "variations which seem to us in our ignorance to arise spontaneously." ("Origin of Species" (6th edition), page 421.) The selection theory demands the further postulate that such changes, "whether extremely slight or strongly marked," are inherited.

Darwin was no nearer to an experimental proof of this a.s.sumption than to the discovery of the actual cause of variability. It was not until the later years of his life that Darwin was occupied with the "perplexing problem... what causes almost every cultivated plant to vary" ("Life and Letters", Vol. III. page 342.): he began to make experiments on the influence of the soil, but these were soon given up.

In the course of the violent controversy which was the outcome of Darwin's work the fundamental principles of his teaching were not advanced by any decisive observations. Among the supporters and opponents, Nageli (Nageli, "Theorie der Abstammungslehre", Munich, 1884; cf. Chapter III.) was one of the few who sought to obtain proofs by experimental methods. His extensive cultural experiments with alpine Hieracia led him to form the opinion that the changes which are induced by an alteration in the food-supply, in climate or in habitat, are not inherited and are therefore of no importance from the point of view of the production of species. And yet Nageli did attribute an important influence to the external world; he believed that adaptations of plants arise as reactions to continuous stimuli, which supply a need and are therefore useful. These opinions, which recall the teleological aspect of Lamarckism, are entirely unsupported by proof. While other far-reaching attempts at an explanation of the theory of descent were formulated both in Nageli's time and afterwards, some in support of, others in opposition to Darwin, the necessity of investigating, from different standpoints, the underlying causes, variability and heredity, was more and more realised. To this category belong the statistical investigations undertaken by Quetelet and Galton, the researches into hybridisation, to which an impetus was given by the re-discovery of the Mendelian law of segregation, as also by the culture experiments on mutating species following the work of de Vries, and lastly the consideration of the question how far variation and heredity are governed by external influences. These latter problems, which are concerned in general with the causes of form-production and form-modification, may be treated in a short summary which falls under two heads, one having reference to the conditions of form-production in single species, the other being concerned with the conditions governing the transformation of species.

I. THE INFLUENCE OF EXTERNAL CONDITIONS ON FORM-PRODUCTION IN SINGLE SPECIES.

The members of plants, which we express by the terms stem, leaf, flower, etc. are capable of modification within certain limits; since Lamarck's time this power of modification has been brought more or less into relation with the environment. We are concerned not only with the question of experimental demonstration of this relations.h.i.+p, but, more generally, with an examination of the origin of forms, the sequences of stages in development that are governed by recognisable causes. We have to consider the general problem; to study the conditions of all typical as well as of atypic forms, in other words, to found a physiology of form.

If we survey the endless variety of plant-forms and consider the highly complex and still little known processes in the interior of cells, and if we remember that the whole of this branch of investigation came into existence only a few decades ago, we are able to grasp the fact that a satisfactory explanation of the factors determining form cannot be discovered all at once. The goal is still far away. We are not concerned now with the controversial question, whether, on the whole, the fundamental processes in the development of form can be recognised by physiological means. A belief in the possibility of this can in any case do no harm. What we may and must attempt is this--to discover points of attack on one side or another, which may enable us by means of experimental methods to come into closer touch with these elusive and difficult problems. While we are forced to admit that there is at present much that is insoluble there remains an inexhaustible supply of problems capable of solution.

The object of our investigations is the species; but as regards the question, what is a species, science of to-day takes up a position different from that of Darwin. For him it was the Linnean species which ill.u.s.trates variation: we now know, thanks to the work of Jordan, de Bary, and particularly to that of de Vries (de Vries, "Die Mutationstheorie", Leipzig, 1901, Vol. I. page 33.), that the Linnean species consists of a large or small number of ent.i.ties, elementary species. In experimental investigation it is essential that observations be made on a pure species, or, as Johannsen (Johannsen, "Ueber Erblichkeit in Populationen und reinen Linien", Jena, 1903.) says, on a pure "line." What has long been recognised as necessary in the investigation of fungi, bacteria and algae must also be insisted on in the case of flowering plants; we must start with a single individual which is reproduced vegetatively or by strict self-fertilisation.

In dioecious plants we must aim at the reproduction of brothers and sisters.

We may at the outset take it for granted that a pure species remains the same under similar external conditions; it varies as these vary. IT IS CHARACTERISTIC OF A SPECIES THAT IT ALWAYS EXHIBITS A CONSTANT RELATION TO A PARTICULAR ENVIRONMENT. In the case of two different species, e.g.

the hay and anthrax bacilli or two varieties of Campanula with blue and white flowers respectively, a similar environment produces a constant difference. The cause of this is a mystery.

According to the modern standpoint, the living cell is a complex chemico-physical system which is regarded as a dynamical system of equilibrium, a conception suggested by Herbert Spencer and which has acquired a constantly increasing importance in the light of modern developments in physical chemistry. The various chemical compounds, proteids, carbohydrates, fats, the whole series of different ferments, etc. occur in the cell in a definite physical arrangement. The two systems of two species must as a matter of fact possess a constant difference, which it is necessary to define by a special term. We say, therefore, that the SPECIFIC STRUCTURE is different.

By way of ill.u.s.trating this provisionally, we may a.s.sume that the proteids of the two species possess a constant chemical difference. This conception of specific structure is specially important in its bearing on a further treatment of the subject. In the original cell, eventually also in every cell of a plant, the characters which afterwards become apparent must exist somewhere; they are integral parts of the capabilities or potentialities of specific structure. Thus not only the characters which are exhibited under ordinary conditions in nature, but also many others which become apparent only under special conditions (In this connection I leave out of account, as before, the idea of material carriers of heredity which since the publication of Darwin's Pangenesis hypothesis has been frequently suggested. See my remarks in "Variationen der Bluten", "Pringsheim's Jahrb. Wiss. Bot." 1905, page 298; also Detto, "Biol. Centralbl." 1907, page 81, "Die Erklarbarkeit der Ontogenese durch materielle Anlagen".), are to be included as such potentialities in cells; the conception of specific structure includes the WHOLE OF THE POTENTIALITIES OF A SPECIES; specific structure comprises that which we must always a.s.sume without being able to explain it.