146 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



and mother, went to the same parish school and grew up 

 under exactly similar conditions. A was an excellent labourer, 

 steady and sober. Emigrating to South Africa he became 

 a ganger on railway works, and he has now by his steadi- 

 ness, thrift and good conduct himself become a contractor, 

 whilst all the time he has been a kind and liberal son to his 

 widowed mother, and also helped his brothers. B too is 

 an excellent labourer, kind to his old mother, with whom he 

 lives, but has heavy drinking bouts at intervals and wastes 

 his earnings. C, also an excellent labourer, but unsteady, 

 was brought out to Africa by A, and given a good start. 

 A and C have lately been home to see their mother. C brought 

 home with him a considerable amount of money, with the 

 only result that his stay in his native village has been one long 

 debauch for himself and B. A, the steady railway contractor, 

 is now really part of "society," but as all the time he has been 

 kind and generous to his family, he cannot be accused of having 

 pushed his brothers into the mire. The present condition of 

 the latter is the result of their own conduct, which itself is 

 probably due to bad heredity. Though equal in physique 

 to their brother, they are lacking in that morale which has 

 made him a good "sport" and is one of the chief elements, 

 if not the chief element, in the evolution of the middle and 

 upper classes. This example could unfortunately be multiplied 

 by thousands, not only in the case of labourers' families, but 

 also in those of the middle and upper classes. Mr. Houghton, 

 and those who think with him, would do well to contemplate 

 these facts before they write about the wickedness of " society " 

 in pushing the poor into the mire. 



I have now dealt seriatim with Mr. Houghton's strictures 

 on my doctrines of racial origin and racial criteria ; and in 

 each case — whether it be osteology, pigmentation, language, 

 religion, or sociology — the evidence adduced, which might 

 be largely multiplied, shows that the fundamental assumption 

 on which he bases his attacks— that Man is free from the laws 

 which condition the rest of Nature — has no support in fact. 



