EUGENICS 229 



Struct family trees comprising all our ancestors, we do not get far back 

 until we meet persons who, both in personal and social respects, would 

 be regarded as rather undesirable relatives by the present bearers of the 

 family name. Such an investigation is not apt to promote our respect for 

 the so-called "blue-blood." 



On the whole, persistent misconceptions are wide-spread in the fields 

 with which we are dealing. Some of them even have nothing to do with 

 heredity. This applies for instance to the belief in telegony, after-ejflFect, 

 which even Darwin shared. Dog-breeders have been particularly prone 

 to this belief. It is thought that a bitch that by accident has been mated with 

 a male dog of another breed is spoiled, useless for future pure breeding. 

 Now when we know the mechanism of fertilization it needs no explana- 

 tion that this belief is entirely absurd. Mating, and the fact that a litter 

 of mixed breed has stayed temporarily in the uterus of the bitch has of 

 course not the slightest influence on the germ cells present in her ovary 

 and the genes which they contain. 



MATERNAL IMPRESSIONS 



More serious in its consequences is the old deep-rooted belief in "ma- 

 ternal impressions" which has caused much unfounded self-reproach 

 among conscientious mothers. Everybody has probably met with the 

 popular conviction that if a pregnant woman happens to see the head of 

 a hare, there is imminent danger of the coming child developing harelip, 

 or even cleft-palate. Birth-marks are traced to burns acquired by the 

 mother, in corresponding locations, and temperamental deviations in a 

 child are attributed to the mother's distress or loss of temper during 

 pregnancy. Conversely, I know of a case in which the husband sys- 

 tematically took his newly married wife to fine concerts in order that the 

 expected child might be musical in contrast to the parents. No wonder 

 that he was badly disappointed at the results of the treatment. 



One might expect that it would be comparatively easy to persuade 

 people that external influences of this sort do not penetrate deeply enough 

 to produce changes in the child, which, as an independent individual, 

 happens to spend the first nine months of life as a parasite within the 

 mother's body. But as a matter of fact, according to my experience, it is 

 exceedingly difficult to persuade the parents that the fate of the child in 

 these respects is irrevocably determined already at fertilization, when the 

 two germ cells meet. 



STERILIZATION 



In the United States, up to 1933, about 16,000 persons had been sterilized 

 because they were for difi^erent reasons considered unfit for propagation. 

 But an American committee estimated that no less than 15 million persons 

 ought to be sterilized up to 1980, starting with 100,000 a year and increas- 



