370 Beard, Heredity and the Cause of Variation. 



SO clear that only the fit should survive, for as others have insisted, 

 chance comes in. In any case the result is not one, whicli can 

 induce Variation, or produce varieties, or give rise to new species. 

 By the self-regulating mechanism of germinal elimination, etc. 

 Nature must in all sexual reproduction eliminate half of the groups 

 of characters, half of the individualities. In its magnitude this is 

 appalling, and it results in an election beside which natural 

 selection is as nothing. Of the individual Galton long ago said, 

 that it was the trustee of the germ-cells. In the light of present 

 results how true this is! In our social life the parent is made 

 answerable, more or less, for the education and well-being of his 

 children. Of this responsibility nothing whatever is assigned for 

 the little insignificant, but for good and ill immensely potent, en- 

 tities, the germ-cells! While for the state, for the Commonwealth 

 it may be — it is not said that it is — a matter of indifference 

 under what environment the individual pass his span of life, for 

 the good of the race it can only be of the utmost moment, that, 

 as the germ-cells are the seed of the stock, contained in individuals, 

 the total environment should be made, so far as it is possible, of 

 the healthiest and best description for the latter. The weekly or 

 yearly table of death-rate is no sure index of national improvement 

 or deterioration, for even degeneration and longevity may go hand 

 in hand. The recent report of the Royal Commission on Physical 

 Training (Scotland) furnishes matter for serious consideration, and 

 it reflects the all-powerful influence of the conditions of natural 

 existence, to him who can read between its lines, in as clear a 

 fashion as do the facts of mimicry. In considering the welfare of 

 the race, it would not be wise to lay stress on the fact, that where 

 necessary Nature eliminates the unfit, for to permit of this it must 

 be possible to prevent the mating of the unfit with the unfit. 

 Rather, let it be borne in mind, that in the words of H. G. Wells 

 „Nature is a reckless coupler — and she slays", and that on occasion 

 she may remorselessly destroy not merely the total individuals of a 

 variety but even of a species. With the wealthy scarcely less than 

 with the poor reform is urgently called for. The higher classes 

 of Society are not recruited to any great extent fi'om among them- 

 selves, but from those, the middle classes, beneath them. A most 

 significant fact! The population of cities is recruited from the 

 country, just as the middle classes reinforce the aristocracy. The 

 rural and middle classes are and must be the mainstay of a nation, 

 for with them are the best attempts at adaptation to the en- 

 vironment. But the poor we have always with us, and the great 

 problem for the city-rulers, ay, for the statesman, is how to make 

 their total environment such, that instead of deteriorating in them 

 the stock shall improve. Fortunate the race which breeds statesmen 

 capable of solving such a problem, for beyond measure is the 

 greatness of him, who shall achieve success in this task! 



