First International Eugenics Congress,
London, July, 1912.
LIST OF EXHIBITS.
A.
Exhibited by E. G. Wheler, Esq.
A 1
Portrait of Sir Francis Galton, by Charles Furze, 1903.
A 2
Silhouettes of Dr. Erasmus Darwin and his son Erasmus.
A 3
Silhouette of Mrs. Darwin.
A 4
Silhouettes of Samuel Tertius Galton, his son Erasmus and three daughters.
B.
Exhibited by William E. and Leonard Darwin
B 1
Portrait of Charles Darwin, by W. W. Ouless, R A., painted in 1875.
B 2
Portrait of Erasmus Darwin (after Wright, of Derby), the common grandfather of Charles Darwin and Francis Galton.
B 3
Photograph of Charles Darwin, by Maull & Polyblank, taken about the year 1854.
B 4
Leopold Flameng's Engraving, after the portrait of Charles Darwin, by the Hon. John Collier, painted in the year 1881—now in the National Portrait Gallery.
B 5
Photograph of Charles Darwin on his horse Tommy.
B 6
Photograph of the small study at Down in which the "Origin of Species" was written.
B 7
Etching by Axel Haig of the large study at Down, which Charles Darwin occupied from about 1887 onwards.
B 8
Water-colour Drawing of Down House, by Albert Goodwin, painted in 1882.
B 9
Two letters of Charles Darwin, on "Worms and their Habits,"
C.
Exhibited by Professor von Gruber.
C 1 & 2
Experiments by P. Kammerer onchanges produced in the colours in the skin of the Fire Salamander—Salamandra maculosa—by keeping them on yellow or black earth respectively.
According as to whether the animals are kept on yellow or black earth the yellow or black colouring of the skin spreads, andthis change of colour appears in the same way in the offspring, though a direct influence of the colour of the earth on the germ plasm is absolutely unthinkable. The two pictures in the lower part of Figure C 1 show the colouring of that generation to which the animal portrayed above belongs, according as to whether they have been kept permanently on yellow soil (right) or returned again to black soil (left). Here, it is true, it is not a question of a new quality or tendency. The capacity in the parents to deposit black pigment in their skin has been increased or decreased according to their surroundings. But the distinctive point remains, that their offspring is subsequently endowed with the inherited tendency to produce proportionately more or less pigment. This may, however, be a direct result of the abnormal life conditions of the parents, in so far as the depositing of more or less pigment in the skin of the parents is certainly not a purely local process, but rather is bound up with other metabolic changes which may extend to or influence the developing gametes.
C 3 & 4
Very remarkable are thehereditary changeswhich Kammerer established inAlytes obstetricans—the midwife toad.
With them copulation normally takes place on dry land. The male extricates from the female the string of eggs, winds it round his hind legs and carries it about until the eggs are ready. Then, and not till then, he enters the water where the larvæ escape. If, however, one keeps these toads in a high temperature (25-30 C.) they enter the water to cool themselves and abandon their normal way of manipulating their brood because the string of spawn swells in water and does not remain sufficiently sticky to allow the male to fasten it to his thighs. The animals become gradually accustomed to live in water, and continue to carry on the business of reproduction there, even when the temperature is normal. As soon as the new instinct has become sufficiently established with the parents they beget offspring, which at a normal temperature go of their own accord into water to deposit their eggs, and also produce eggs more numerous than, and somewhat different from, those of the normal toad. Further, the males of this succeeding generation develop thumbs and forearms of a character which enables them to perform the difficult task of holding the females during copulation in the water.
C 5 & 6
The likeness of offspring to their parents is extremely great and goes into many details; this we frequently overlook because a divergence strikes us more than a similarity. A similarity becomes striking when it is a question of familiar peculiarities. These often relate to exterior unimportant peculiarities. Our collection containsa pedigree(taken by Dr. Walter Bell from Bateson's "Mendel's Principles of Heredity"), Figure C 5,of a family with peculiarly curled hair; also in Figure C 6, acase of heredity of a lock of white hair, likewise taken from Bateson's work by Rizzoli.
C 7
The heredity of physical qualities is strikingly illustrated in Weinberg's Table C 7, showing the ageat death of the parents and the marital gross and nett fertility. It is founded on the Stuttgart family registers, and comprises about 1,900 non-tubercular and about 3,000 tubercular families ("Archiv für Rassen and Gesellschafts Biologie" and Württemberger Jahrbücher für Statistik und Landeskunde, 1911). W. Weinberg adds:
Relation of Age at Death of Parents to Gross and Nett Fertility.(After Weinberg.)- Non-tuberculous families, number of children surviving 20th year.- Tuberculous" " " " "- Non-tuberculous families, number of children dying before attaining 20th year.- Tuberculous" " " " "Number of non-tuberculous families about 1,900 (1876-79-86), of tuberculous about 3,000 (1873-89); from Stuttgart family registers.Figure C 7.
Relation of Age at Death of Parents to Gross and Nett Fertility.(After Weinberg.)
Number of non-tuberculous families about 1,900 (1876-79-86), of tuberculous about 3,000 (1873-89); from Stuttgart family registers.
Figure C 7.
"The gross as well as the nett fertility of those which have died increases with the age attained, the latter, however, in a greater degree, because the mortality of children decreases with the greater age attained at death. With the wife the curve is less steep and less regular, because in her case mortality is unfavourably influenced by the birth functions; this is particularly plainly seen in the case of tuberculous women, when the curve has two peaks."
C 8
The same fact of heredity of "constitution" is demonstrated in Weinberg's Table C 8 showing theage at death of the parents andthe mortality of the children up to the age of 20.It is based on the same material as Table 7 and proves: "With the increasing age of the parents child mortality decreases, especially so in the case of the children of the tuberculous, and the number of children reaching the age of sexual maturity increases correspondingly."
Age at Death of Parents and Mortality of the Children up to the Age of 20 (including Still-born).Non-tuberculous.Tuberculous.Deaths per 100 living-born children:Age at death of father of motherof father of motherFigure C 8.
Age at Death of Parents and Mortality of the Children up to the Age of 20 (including Still-born).
Figure C 8.
C 9 & 10
The same is proved by the two Tables C 9 and 10 by Ploëtz referring toage at death of fathers and mothers and child mortality up to the age of five years. Very striking in both these tables is the extremely low mortality of the offspring of the parents with the greatest longevity.
C 11
Table C 11 by Weinberg:Hereditary of the disposition to beget twins(Archiv für Rassen & Gesellschafts Biologie VI. 1909) is remarkable. "The difference in favour of sisters speaks for Mendel's law of dominance and recessivity. The more twins a woman has borne, the more frequently the same phenomena is found in her nearest female relations." That the mortality among twins is very great is a well-known fact.
Inheritance of Tendency to Bear Twins.About 2,000 families from Würtemberg family registers (after Weinberg).In every 100,000 Births Twin Births occur in the following numbers:Total populationAmong daughtersof mothersof twins" maidens" sistersFigure C 11.
Inheritance of Tendency to Bear Twins.About 2,000 families from Würtemberg family registers (after Weinberg).In every 100,000 Births Twin Births occur in the following numbers:
Figure C 11.
In every 1,000 Births there are the following numbers of Twin Births among the immediate relatives:Of all mothersOf women who have had 1 multiple birth" " 2 " "" " 3 or more "Mortality of Twins.Percentage of deaths before the age of 20:Single-born ChildrenTwinsFigure C 11 (continued).
In every 1,000 Births there are the following numbers of Twin Births among the immediate relatives:
Mortality of Twins.Percentage of deaths before the age of 20:
Figure C 11 (continued).
C 12
Figure C 12 the celebrated pedigree of the Hæmophilicfamily(bleeders)Mampel(by Rüdin after Lossen).
C 13
Figure C 13 showing the inheritance of progressive muscularatrophy(after Eichhorst).
C 14
Figure C 14 a partial reproduction of apedigreecomprising over 2,000 people of the family Nongaret suffering from inherited stationary nightblindness(compiled by Cunier, Truc and Nettleship). With regard to these figures it is to be noted that only a fraction of the offspring is affected with the illness, the remainder being perfectly normal. It is remarkable with the bleeders (Hæmophilic persons) that the females do not suffer from the disease though they transfer it to their male offspring; a similar latent disposition is observable in other hereditary conditions, especially colour-blindness.
C 15
W. Weinberg shows in Table C 15 thefrequency of tuberculosis within families. He adds: "This is a comparison of the experiences of married tubercular individuals, regarding the frequency of tuberculosis among their parents, brothers and sisters, with the corresponding experiences of their husbands or wives who come on an average from similar surroundings. The experiences of the latter represent the normal expectation. It is especially striking that the family influence tells most with the children of the well-to-do." The well-known fact that the tuberculous frequently come from tuberculous stock is clearly demonstrated in the figures of this table.
C 16
C 17
In Table C 16 Dr. Otto Diem shows thedistribution of particular taintsin every hundred of the tainted membersamong the nearest relations(parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts, brothers and sisters)of the entire material he deals with. It is shown for instance that with the mentally sound, 15% of the tainted relatives were mentally diseased against 45.9% with the mentally diseased. Figure C 17 shows the share of this percentage among the parents only. It is demonstrated that with the mentally diseased a much larger percentage of the total hereditary taint is traceable to parental madness, alcoholism, abnormality of character, than with the mentally sound.
C 18
Figure C 18 corresponds, with figure C 17, except that not only the parents are reckoned but the nearest defective relative in any degree.
C 19
Figure C 19 teaches that the reckoning of all the taints in the ancestry taken together with the collaterals fails to give as clear and convincing a picture of the dissimilarity in the heredity of mentally sound and diseased, as the reckoning of the taints among the parents alone. The establishment of the hereditary taint in the direct ancestry appears therefore by far the more important.
C 20
In Figure 144 (Journal f. Psychologie und Neurologie. XIII. Bd.) Drf. Hans W. Mayer gives a number of examples ofheredity among moral imbeciles, and he draws the following conclusions: "Consequently moral defect in frequent combination with alcoholism is hereditary in the highest degree. Remedy: Incarceration of these dangerous individuals, not according to the accidental form of the crime committed, but as diseased and forming a public danger. If there is a risk of escape or if liberty is conceded—undoubtedly sterilization to prevent perpetuation of the defect." This latter course is already followed in North America, and a start has been made with it in Switzerland, at least in cases where the consent of the patients is obtained.
C 21
The pedigree of thefamily of Zero von Jorger, figure C 21 (Archiv für Rassen & Gesellschafts biologie I.), shows in a convincing manner how very important for the protection of society is the prevention of the reproduction of the degenerate. In the course of time this family has burdened the sound and fit with taxation amounting to hundreds of thousands of pounds. The author remarks: "The family Zero springs from good peasant stock intermarrying with homeless female tramps. Its history shows how alcohol (especially spirits) and bad environment (in this case always combined) may create a scourge to society which continues from generation to generation. The family has produced many criminals, lunatics and feeble-minded persons. The offspring of these are destined to die out. Their great fertility at times is counteracted by great infant mortality."
"In places regeneration is evident which invariably is inaugurated by marriage with a good woman and the consequent abandonment of the abuse of alcohol. As with the degeneration so with the regeneration the wife takes the leading part."
The question whether modern civilized races are degenerate in body and mind is much disputed. In some respects for instance in the increase of myopia and caries of the teeth it is generally admitted, but in others it is doubtful, though it may be considered an established fact that the general average of health among all civilized nations is unsatisfactory. We do not know for certain whether the general level of all or certain qualities is being lowered or not, and still less can we say what part is played by heredity.
The demand for the systematic collection of data on these points is the first which Race Hygiene has to make from Governments.
The examinations as to fitness for military service in Germany might offer an excellent index of the physique of the people, but for this purpose the physical condition of the conscripts would have to be recorded in a much more thorough manner than at present (S. Gruber Concordia, 1916). There appears, however, to be no doubt that in general the country and agricultural pursuits produce young men of better average health than do towns and other occupations. This agrees with the fact that the life of the inhabitants in rural districts and of those engaged in agriculture is longer than that of town dwellers.
C 22
Table C 22comparestheduration of lifeof men livingin towns withthose living inrural districts in Prussia. Beyond all doubt the peasant population is still constitutionally the most valuable part of the people, and the colonisation at home, such as the Prussian Government is pursuing to an increasing degree, may become of the very highest value for the improvement of the race.
C 23, 24 & 25
Dr. Walter Abelsdorff gives the following explanations to Table C 23, and figures C 24 and C 25. "They endeavour to show the number offamilies brought 'back to the land' in North Germanyin the years 1900-1910."
"The Royal Commission for settlement in West Prussia and Posen has achieved notable results since the beginning of its activity in 1886. This body has brought about from 1886 to 1910 the settlement in the country of 18,507 families, 18,127 in leaseholds and 305 in labourers' dwellings. For 1900 to 1910 the total number of families settled amount to 14,511."
"The Royal General Commission began its activity later, but since 1906 has been energetically pursuing the settlement of agricultural labourers. At Münster, in the years 1908 to 1910, 247 leasehold small holdings for artisans have been created."
"The results of the Royal District Administrations are as yet less considerable, those of private societies with State subvention, though irregular, are worthy of note."
"The total work of settlement is almost exclusively effected by the Commission for settlements and the General Commission."
"Counting five members to each family, 130,000 people have been brought into economically improved conditions. In how far this may benefit the second generation—the children of the settlers—cannot as yet be determined."
"These efforts, however, may be looked upon as a regenerative component among the measures for the improvement of the people."
C 26 & 27
Figure C 26 deals with thefitness for military service in Germany in relation to the locality of birthand theoccupationof the individual or the parents. Table C 27 withfitness for military service in town and country(both after Wellmann).
Fitness for Military Service according to Place of Birth and Calling.German Empire, 1902-08.Percentage of Recruits examined and found fit:
Fitness for Military Service according to Place of Birth and Calling.German Empire, 1902-08.Percentage of Recruits examined and found fit:
Figure C 26.
Fitness for Military Service in Town and Country. (After Wellmann.)
Figure C 27.
C 28
Enlistments into the Armyin Germany in 1907 and 1908,according to size(number of inhabitants)of native place, are shown by Dr. Walter Abelsdorff in Figure C 28.
C 29
Figure C 29 showsthe percentage of those found fit in the final examination in Bavariaandoccupation of the parents.
C 30
Table C 30 shows the total of all thenon-commissioned officers and privates in the German Armyon December 1st, 1906,classed according as they came from town or countryandaccording to the occupation or the parents.
Attention is invited to the fact that according to Figure C 26 the percentage of those found fit for military service in Germany has diminished in recent years, but it is doubtful whether this is caused by a general lowering of physique. It may be due to the application of a higher standard in consequence of increased supply. The distinct increase in height, in Germany as well as in many other European countries, of those obliged to offer themselves for military service speaks against deterioration in the average of physique. Against the suggestion that with the increase in height may be coupled a greater disposition to tuberculosis must be set the fact that amongst the tall is found a percentage of fit higher than the average.
Abelsdorff remarks of Table C 27: "The results of recruiting for the years 1907 and 1908 have been grouped according to the size of the place of birth of the recruits.
The average for the whole empire in 1907 is 54.9, in 1908 54.5, fit in every 100 finally examined. The percentage of fitness has diminished 0.4% from 1907 to 1908. The numbers for 1904, 1905 and 1906 are respectively 56.4, 56.3, and 55.9%.
Towns with over 1,000,000 inhabitants show the smallest number of fit: 1907, 31.4%; 1908, 28.2%. The decline is 3.2%. Compared with the figure for the whole empire it shows 23.5% less fitness in 1907 and 26.3% in 1908.
For towns of 500,000 to 1,000,000 inhabitants the figures are slightly better; they reach 39.9% in 1907 and 44.0% in 1908; an improvement of 4.9% on the figures of the largest towns. The other three classes, viz., towns with 200,000 to 500,000; 100,000 to 200,000 and 50,000 to 100,000 inhabitants, show comparatively little variation in their figures for fitness for military service. They are 50.1% and 48.9%; 47.9 and 48.2%; 51.8 and 51.5%. The differences between the two years are not material. With the towns of from 200,000 to 500,000 and from 50,000 to 100,000 inhabitants there has been a decrease against an increase in those of from 100,000 to 200,000 inhabitants. But the figures for all three classes remain behind the average figure for the empire and so do those of all towns, they show 50.4 and 50.1%.
The most favourable results are yielded by the country districts. Here there were fit in 1907 58%, in 1908 57.7%. A trifling decrease is shown even here. The figures, however, are higher by 3.1% in 1907 and 3.2% in 1908 than the average for the empire. The conclusion is that the fitness is highest in the smallest, and lowest in the largest places.
Taking the average for the Empire as 100, those found fit from country districts number 106, from towns 92, from towns of over 50,000 inhabitants 83, and from towns of over 100,000 only 80."
The tables showing the recruiting results amongst those qualified for the one year voluntary service are particularly interesting.
C 31
In Table C 31 Schwiening (Veröffentlichungen aus dem Militär Sanitatswesen. 40. Berlin, Hirschwald, 1909) gives the figures of those finally passed asfit for military service in the Mittelschulen(secondary schools),which are classified according to their nature. The figures are too optimistic because no account has been taken of those who were found temporarily unfit. The Classical Schools (Gymnasium) give the least satisfactory results.
Fitness for Military Service and Secondary Schools.Of every 100 of the pupils of the following Schools
Figure C 31.
C 32
Table C 32 gives theprincipal reasons for which students have been rejected as unfit for military service.
Causes of Unfitness for Military Service in the German Empire, 1904-6.Of every 100 permanently unfit.
Causes of Unfitness for Military Service in the German Empire, 1904-6.Of every 100 permanently unfit.
Figure C 32.
C 33
Table C 33 is acomparison of the frequency of the various causes of unfitness as between those qualified for the one year's voluntary service and the recruits in general. This table is very remarkable, because it shows the preponderance of general weakness, diseases of the heart and large vessels, and pulmonary defects among the former.
Military Fitness and Secondary Schools.Percentage of unfit to every 100 recruits examined.
Figure C 33.
C 34
It goes without saying that the schools are only responsible to a lesser degree for this; we have to deal here with a serious symptom of a bad constitution amongst the higher social grades which betrays itself also in the dying out of the socially prominent families. How badly their progeny comes off, in spite of the great care bestowed on it, is illustrated in Table C 34. In two Munich Regiments the percentage of fit among all those entitled to offer themselves for the one year's service from the most varied parts of Germany was only, according to Dieudonné, 21.6, 20.1, and 16.4.
C 35 & 36
Great anxiety is justly caused by the increasing number of those taken care of in public Lunatic Asylums. It remains doubtful to what degree this may be due to the greater use made of asylums and the decrease of the care of the mentally infirm in the family home; the deterioration of the nervous system nevertheless remains according to the general impression an incontestable fact. As asymptom of this may be interpreted the increasingnumber of suicides in civilised countries, demonstrated in Rüdin's Tables, C 35 and C 36, showing the number of suicides in every one million of inhabitants.
More serious still than the frequency of mental and nervous diseases is another phenomenon which demonstrates how unsatisfactory is the constitutional condition of large circle of our population of to-day.
This phenomenon which as yet has received much too little attention isthe large scale on which families die out, at first in the male line. Apparently (sufficient observations for control are not available) those families which hold an eminent economical or social position (aristocracy, old county families, etc., etc.) are mainly concerned. Because exceptional endowment in one or more respects (intelligence, talent, will power, etc.) is generally required to secure or to maintain a leading position, and because such endowment is given to only a small fraction of the population, but is inherited largely by the progeny, this dying out of the leading families means a serious loss to the race.
The deficient fertility of the stock thus endowed results in a lower average of mental capacity in the population generally, and cannot in the long run be made up by the constant re-appearance of distinguished men appearing as variations, the smallest number of whom are "mutations."
The tendency among town families to die out appears to be wide-spread. Professor S. Schott in Tables C 37-C 40 adds materially to our knowledge on this point, Professor Schott makes the following comment on his Tables:—
"S. Schott. Old Mannheim families, 4 tables."
"Source: 'Old Mannheim families. A contribution to the family statistics of the 19th Century by Professor Dr. Sigmund Schott, Mannheim and Leipzig, 1910. J. Rensheimer.' Statistical demonstration of the development, decline, and extinction of about 4,000 families which were in existence at Mannheim at the beginning of the 19th Century, based on permanently maintained family registers. This research, pursued on a basis of population statistics, lends itself only to a limited degree to application for biological purposes."
C 37
Gradual extinction of the Mannheim families in the 19th Century.Only extinction by death in Mannheim and in the male line are taken into account. Families which have disappeared through emigration have been excluded. Branches of families which have become extinct at Mannheim may be flourishing elsewhere. Of 3,081 families, 2,538 have become extinct by death at Mannheim itself, 543 survive. The spiral curve shows the number of survivors in any year as so many per thousand of the original number.
Old Mannheim Families.Gradual extinction of Old Mannheim Families during the 19th century.Figure C 37.
Gradual extinction of Old Mannheim Families during the 19th century.
Gradual extinction of Old Mannheim Families during the 19th century.
Figure C 37.
C 38
Average number of children in each generation; the families being grouped according to the number of generations they attained.The families of 1807 (original families) and their descendants were classed into five groups, according to the number of generations they attained in Mannheim. For each group is calculated the average number of children within one generation—for each separate family as well as for the entire family (i.e., the total of all the separate families which have sprung from the same "original family"). For instance: "Original families" which have lasted into the third generation, 464; the separate families show in the first generation, 464 families, 2,377 children; in the second generation, 718 families, with 3,645 children; in the third generation, 754 families, with 2,454 children. Accordingly, the total families show average numbers 5.1, 7.9, 5.3; the separate families, 5.1, 5.1, 3.3. All these averages are minimum figures, because it was impossible to eliminate the moderate number of couples who emigrated before the number of their offspring was completed.
In the generations up to the third inclusive, reproduction may be considered as terminated, but in the fourth, and especially the fifth and sixth, it still is in progress.
C 39
Age intervals separating the various generations.
Taking into account all the families investigated, the average length of time between the birth of the originator of the family and his first born son was 331/4years, his first born grandchild 632/3years, and his first born great grandchild 951/3years. The curves become gradually flatter, because the possible difference between minimum and maximum age distance from one generation to another increases in arithmetical progression.
C 40
Prolificness of first marriages in the 19th century.Taking the entire period from 1811 to 1890 together the percentage of large families (six children or more) and of small families (one-two children) produced by all first marriages, excluding childless ones, is indicated by the horizontal centreline. The positive or negative deviations from the average during each decade are entered respectively above and below this line. The note in Figure C 38 referring to the families which may have emigrated while still productive applies here also. The temporary increase in prolific marriages after 1870 may be in connection with the material decrease in the age of those contracting marriage for the first time, as compared with the preceding decade. (Men 28.65 in the earlier period as against 27.41 in the later, and women 25.92 against 24.68 years.)
The extinction of the families is undoubtedly due partly to other causes than the voluntary limitation of families—to a process of degeneration. A very remarkable proof of the degenerative character of the dying out of families is given by Pontus Fahlbeck in his book, "The Aristocracy of Sweden" (Fischer, Jena, 1903).
C 38-43
The six Figures C 38-43 give what is biologically of greatest interest in it. Note how the terriblyquick extinctionof thefamiliesof the nobility isinaugurated by catastrophic changes: rapid fall in the frequency of marriages, in the number of fertile marriages, and in the number of their progeny. The curves of the surviving families (red in the original tables) are for comparison. That we have to deal here with a natural and not a voluntary process is shown by the rapid increase in the mortality of male youth in the last generations; also by the extraordinary change in the proportion of the sexes of the children—which, of course, is beyond any control, marked preponderance of girls amongst the survivors (possibly also by the frequency of still-born male children).
A disturbance in the normal proportion of the sexes as a symptom of abnormal germ productionmay also assert itself in the opposite direction. O. Lorenz has pointed out the frequent occurrence of an extraordinary increase of male children immediately before the extinction of a family in the male line. One of the most celebrated of these cases is the one of the family of the Emperor Max II. He had six sons and two daughters, who all reached the age of maturity, but not a single male grandchild in the legitimate male line.
C 44
Fresh evidence is exhibited by von den Velden in Figure C 44. With the families described by von Riffel, who have died out in the male line, there is still a great preponderance of boys in the last generation in which boys have reached the age of sexual maturity, whereas there is a preponderance of females amongst the brothers and sisters of the wives of the last male issue of the family.
Families in Process of Extinction.
Figure C 44.
C 45
In this connection another figure, C 45, by von den Velden ought to be mentioned. He shows, from investigations made by von Riffel, that thephysical condition of childless couples is on the average inferior to that of fertile parents. This, however, by no means holds good in every case. Evidence to the contrary is given by the pedigree of an aristocratic family which has died out in the male line. It may be looked upon as typical. One generation (the second), with three times as many grown up men than women, produces only four boys (44% of the children), of whom two reach maturity. With the fourth generation the male issue dies out.Though a large majority of the members of all three generations (2-4th) have good health and attain to an exceptionally high age, most of the female lines also die out. Only in two branches, which spring from the marriage of an aristocratic daughter with a man from the people, there are children in the fifth generation of whom at least a part promise a healthy progeny. Fahlbeck, too, has drawn attention to the fact that the dying out Swedish aristocracy shows no signs of striking degeneracy in the individual.
This fact is of the greatest theoretical and practical importance because it proves that there exists, up to a certain degree, an independent degeneration of the germ plasm, even as the germ plasm may remain unaffected by damage to the soma. That such a one-sided degeneration of the germ plasm with respect to the power of reproduction may take place among animals has been known for a long time.
In particular, Chs. Darwin has collected facts of this kind in his "Variation of Animals and Plants under Domestication." For civilised peoples it is a matter for reflection that with animals even slight deviations from their customary "natural" mode of living may lead to such serious consequences.
RACE-HYGIENE.
C 46 & 47
As thenature and aims of race-hygieneare still unknown in wide circles it will be useful to show in Tables C 46 and C 47, by A. Ploëtz, what its position is amongst other sciences and what the various branches of its activity consist in.
Many theoretical workers hold that the most important mission or race-hygiene is to fight against Therapeutics and Hygiene of the individual, for about these they have the most serious misgivings. They consider, that by maintaining inferior variations up to the age of reproduction, the average quality of the race must suffer and that to certain defects—which otherwise would rapidly disappear—an opportunity is given to spread through an entire people. This point of view, short sighted as it may be, must be examined into. It appears to be forgotten that on the one hand hygiene is powerless in cases of a high degree of degeneration and that on the other hand hygiene, by prevention of illness, does away with a number of causes of inferiority. Finally it appears to be entirely overlooked that with the best inherent qualities and unfavourable surroundings the individual development may be poor and stunted. Of what use are the highest potentialities if they remain latent? The main pointis that so far convincing proofs of the preponderant harmfulness of hygiene are entirely absent. (S. Gruber, Heredity, Selection and Hygiene. Deutsche med. Wochenschr, 1909).