OCR Text |
Show HAS A CURIOUS TRANSFORMATION, Th Aiolotl theoaasa Aaelhe Aalssal le Gerlela LueellUsa, Naturalists have long been familiar with a newt-like creature, breathing by gills and lungs both, and Inhabiting Inhabit-ing the lakes of Mexico and other American Am-erican waters. This Is the aiolotl. It was also discovered that In certain localities this creature, which by th way breeds freely In Mexico, sheds Its akin, casta off its gills and Its tall An, develops another color of body and leavoe the water to become a land newt Under tbls latter guise It Is known as the amblystoma. Naturally, the explanation of this curious transformation reat on the fact that the axolutl Is really the young or tadpole stage of the amblystoma ambly-stoma form, but tbe peculiarity her la that in Its Arat stage It should breed and multiply and continue to reproduce axolutla, as If It were a perfectly per-fectly mature animal. The occurrence of such case points out to us on way In which specie can be evolved, for, bad we not been acquainted with the relationship of these forma, nobody no-body would have hesitated to describe des-cribe them as two essentially distinct animals. Lately It has been shown, says the London Chronicle, that, while In Colorado Colo-rado and Dakota the transformation Is complete, lu Mexico the aiolotl stage Is appsrently permanent. Here, probably, the Influence of environment environ-ment on a living being la typically Illustrated. |