EOTITOTO SUERGTERAPICO MILANESE
“SEANFING BELEANTE Foglio Noone

18/8/52

Dear Hgyes,

Thank you for your letter of August,1l4th. I am
just back from my rather short vacations,whieh have not con-
verted me into a highly aggressive adversary,so that your
fears are not fully justified. My own point of view is that,
in the whole story, F+ is almost accidental,and that donor and
accepter are almust-synonims of male and female gametes, but
I would not dare to use the former or the latter symbols Zor
K-12,at least at the present stage of experimentation. I am
still convinced that your sentence :"this effect of F+ on the
phenotype of segregants invalidates much ef the evidence for
genetic linkage in K~12" may have to ve altered, especially in
view of the type of evidence contahhed in tabbke 2 of our paper.
However, we obviously need new facts before we can build a theo-
ry,and at least I have given up the hope that a hypothesis put
forward at this stage has many chances of lasting long. But this
is a personal opinion. Berhapsa the discussion that will follow
our papers may help to throw some light on the whole.

It is exceedingly kind of you to undertakew all the
trotle of correcting our paper. I wonder what the Editors maan
by re~plagning, I hope they do not mean a work as formidable as
the word seems to imply. If it &s only Ponte who must be sati-
sfied with it in the end, perhaps he may explain it to us with
more detaila at Pallanza. I am usumally apireciative of the
critical work done by Editors,so that I do not mind any kind
of reproach én their side,exeept that in this case the work
of mending happens to fall on your shoulders and I am very
sorry to add sameextra trouble to t e ones you mus: already
have. Otherwise, the plan you suggest is all right for mej;mean-
while I shall have the explanation of table 2 extended and clar
fied,and the table retyped in fiwe copied for the new paper. I
think it would be impossible to let Joshua know about the final
draft before it is sent to the Editor,but I hope the correction
need not be too radical,and in any case he has a chance of kno-
wing about them bafore the proofs come.

Unless I am prevented by some unexpected nuisan-
ce,I shall have th pleasure of meeting you both at the statior
on the morning of the lst. We should, iowever try to dedicate

evenings rather than days to ymax the Correction of the paper,
as it would be very unfair of me to ask you to spend your
free time in Italy on the job of correcthhgxouv paper.
Yours sincerely