FRANCIS G ALT ON 187 



aflame passed through the street and swept the mob along with him. 

 Now social advance is coming to depend more and more upon the re- 

 sults of cold scientific research. 



Herein lies the success of Galton's movement. No accomplishment 

 of recent times is of greater interest to scientific men, for the success 

 which has been attained is due to a social and religious appeal made 

 from a solid foundation of scientific facts. Opinions as to the direction 

 of eugenic reform, or indeed as to the advisability of any immediate at- 

 tempt at practical work, differ greatly but the widespread interest in 

 its problems is an equally widespread admission that biology is to stand 

 in the most vital relation to sociology, that science is to be the hand- 

 maiden of statecraft. 



Hero worship must not blind the scientific biographer to the fact 

 that in the doing of this Francis Galton was bv no means single-handed. 

 Those who preceded him in the fruitless suggestions of race improve- 

 ment may be left out of account; those who labored with him can not. 

 Indeed. I personally feel that in this work there is one name generally 

 closely associated with his own which should take equal rank with his. 



But Francis Galton must always rank as the pioneer — as the one 

 who while the fighting was still hot around the " Origin of Species " 

 and before the " Descent of Man " had yet been written had the insight 

 to see and the courage to say not merely that man was to be included 

 in the evolutionary chain but also that evolution has more than aca- 

 demic interest in its relation to man. He had the courage to argue 

 that just as animals and plants are plastic in the hands of the breeder, 

 so the physical strength and mental vigor of future generations may 

 be moulded by a scientifically enlightened and morally quickened com- 

 munitv. 



The Man and His Methods 



" The greatness of a man is shown in what he is, in what he does, 

 and in what he sets a-doing." 



It would be presumptuous for any one who had not the privilege of 

 years of intimacy to write of Mr. Galton's character and personality. 

 In paragraphs ranging from exploration through physical and biolog- 

 ical sciences to eugenics an outline of what he did and what he set a- 

 doing has been given. The two objects of this section are to state for 

 the benefit of those who can not study his work in detail some of the 

 characteristics of the investigator, and the cardinal features of his 

 contributions to science. In essence, we have to determine what shall 

 be understood by Galtonian. 



A first characteristic was the ability to see essentially new prob- 

 lems or new methods of accomplishing things that needed doing. Some 

 of his results — daily weather charts, anthropometric laboratories, hu- 

 man heredity — like those of Benjamin Franklin, had an obviousness 

 which was cryptic to other eyes. Not only did he see problems but he 



