52 Transactions. 



about 36, a goodly proportion being- made up of one, or at most 

 two, in a parish. Tlie Littles are by no means a small flock. The 

 Richardsons, in contrast to the Smiths, huddle together. Out of 

 32, as many as seventeen are found in Lochmaben alone. Out of 

 32 Littles, six are in Moffat and ten in Langholm. The Bells also 

 crowd together, eight or nine of them being got in one parish. 

 "We referred already to the swarming in Langholm in the case of the 

 Scotts. Swarming is a much less common phenomenon in Nithsdale 

 than in the rest of the County. In Nithsdale, Brown, Dalziel, 

 Kerr, Milligan, M'Naught, Kelloch, and Kennedy prevail more 

 than elsewhere. Smith and Dickson come much to the front in 

 Dumfries parish and burgh. Wright is a surname that swarms. 

 Out of 29 proprietors, 9 are located in Dryfesdale alone. Thomson 

 and Wilson keep well to the front, but the former is the more 

 clannish. Seven are found in the Lockerbie district out of a total 

 of 23. 



To a student of anthropology it would be an interesting field 

 to collect information concerning those Dumfriesshire families. 

 We should like to know, for instance, the average height and 

 weight of the Johnstones, Bells, Irvings, Jardines, Grahams, 

 Scotts, Smiths, Littles, Wilsons, Murrays, AVrights, Maxwells, and 

 Carruthers, which are thirteen surnames at the head of the 

 numerical list. We should like to know their muscularity, their 

 mental bent, the colour of their hair and eyes, and other 

 peculiarities which easily suggest themselves. Then, if we could 

 get a composite photo of each clan, say, taking at random twenty- 

 five of its members after the manner of the composite photos 

 arranged by Francis Galton in his curious book, entitled " Inquiries 

 into Human Faculty," we might learn something as to why these 

 thirteen families had been more successful than others in obtaining 

 property and position in the County. Suppose, now, that 1000 

 Blacks, as many Browns, and as many Whites were taken by 

 random from our population, it would be curious to observe 

 whether the two former were, on the average, more swarthy and 

 more sallow than the latter. Names were often given at first 

 from personal qualities which we may expect to be hereditary. 

 It has been remarked that the Empress Eugenie of France had got 

 a well-formed slightly aquiline nose, a dowry from the Kirk- 

 patricks, of whose blood she had some precious drops within her 

 veins. Would 1000 Armstrongs or Shanklands (meaning long 



