Materials for the Study of Variation Treated with Especial Regard to Discontinuity in the Origin of Species.

inscribed to a colleague

First edition of the most important of Bateson's scientific works published before he rediscovered Mendel's laws. Presentation copy inscribed in the year of publication to his colleague, 'S.F. Harmer, with kind regards, W.B., February 1894'. Uncommon inscribed.

William Bateson (1861-1926) was one of the leading figures in the birth of genetics and the revival of Darwinian evolution at the turn of the twentieth century, though he had initially questioned Darwin's gradual accumulation of small heritable changes and instead studied how major (discontinuous) changes are inherited. He focused on plant hybrids, and the present volume summarised his discoveries (Hook & Norman, Norman Library of Science and Medicine 134). But the book also expounded on a fundamental question: 'Variation is the cause of the evolution of species; but what causes variation, and how does it happen?' (Printing and the Mind of Man 356).

Only two years later, in 1896, Bateson read the first paper by Hugo de Vries in the series that would reintroduce Mendelian genetics to the scientific community. He 'promptly turned to Mendel's text 'Versuche über Pflanzenhybriden' and recognized its significance... Eagerly he persuaded the [Royal Horticultural] society to have the paper translated into English and published in its Journal. Aided by his contacts in the Royal Horticultural Society and his friends in the Royal Society, Bateson gained support for the programme of Mendelian experiments upon which he now embarked' (Oxford Dictionary of National Biography). He went on to make major discoveries in genetics, including the first evidence of Mendelian heredity in humans, and named many of the primary concepts in the field. His campaign for long-term funding of the subject at Cambridge resulted in the endowment of the first chair in genetics.

The recipient of this copy, Sidney Frederic Harmer (1862-1950), was a Cambridge zoologist who focused on invertebrate taxonomy. At the time of publication he was superintendent of the Cambridge University Museum of Zoology, and by 1919 would become director of the Natural History Museum in London. Harmer's Royal Society obituary notes that, 'William Bateson had gone (? about 1885), as Balfour Scholar, to Siberia, where he learned to speak, but not to read, Russian. When he returned he was delighted to find that Harmer, knowing nothing of the language to start with, had translated the titles of all the Russian pamphlets in the Balfour Library'.

First edition, presentation copy inscribed by the author on the verso of the front free endpaper; 8vo; engravings and charts throughout the text, single leaf of undated publisher's ads at rear, spotting throughout; original, fine-dotted green cloth, titles to spine gilt, rectangular panel to boards stamped in blind, green coated endpapers, spine a little rolled and toned, cloth rubbed marked with wear at the tips and a small worn spot on the lower joint, hinges cracked, a very good copy; 598pp.

Hook & Norman, The Norman Library of Science and Medicine 134; Printing and the Mind of Man 356.