INHERITANCE, VARIATION AND SELECTION. 29 



became divided into two branches, so that the head of the contem- 

 porary generation was removed from this man in the seventh de- 

 gree. This distant cousin lived in a different part of France, and 

 being asked if he possessed the same power, immediately gave an 

 exhibition of it. 



BLUSHING. 



Darwin also gives 8 the case of a family consisting of a father, 

 mother, and three children, all of whom, without exception, were 

 prone to blush to a most painful degree. Some of them were sent 

 to travel in order to wear away this diseased sensibility, but noth- 

 ing was of the slightest avail. 



Sir James Paget, 9 while examining the spine of a girl, was 

 struck by her singular manner of blushing; a big splash appeared 

 first on one cheek, and then other splashes, variously scattered over 

 the face and neck. He subsequently asked the mother if her daugh- 

 ter always blushed in this peculiar manner and was answered, 

 "Yes, she takes after me." Sir J. Paget then perceived that by 

 asking this question he had caused the mother to blush; and she 

 exhibited the same peculiarity as her daughter. 



Girou mentions a family in which the father, the children and 

 most of the grandchildren were left-handed. 10 



It will be observed that while the first seven of these examples 

 relate to organs, their number, color and form, the last three relate 

 not so much to the organs themselves as to the inheritance of unus- 

 ual functions of those organs. We thus see that peculiarities of 

 function of organs may be inherited as well as the organs them- 

 selves, and that differences in kind of function, or amount of func- 



(8) Expressions of the Emotions, p. 312. 



(9) Ibid. 



(10) Animals and Plants Under Domestication, Vol. II, p. 15. 



