104 



The Journal of Heredity 



marriage is reduced by a prolonged edu- 

 cation and apprenticeship. 



We see that the action of sexual se- 

 lection in regard to males, while favor- 

 able in some ways, is in great need of 

 improvement. Such efforts ma\' bc> 

 made along three lines. 



MEANS OF IMPROVEMENT. 



1. Try to lead all young men to 

 avoid a loose sexual life and venereal 

 disease. A general effort will be heeded 

 more by the superior than by the 

 inferior. 



2. Hold up the role of husband and 

 father as particularly honorable, and 

 proclaim its shirking, without adequate 

 cause, as dishonorable. For a man to 

 say he has never met a girl whom he 

 can love, simply means he has not dili- 

 gently sought one, or else he has a 

 deficient emotional equipment, for there 

 are many, surprisingly many, estimable, 

 attractive, unmarried women. 



3. Cease prolonging the educational 

 period past the early twenties. The 

 professional schools in our country arc 

 steadily delaying the age of graduation 

 and thereby that of marriage. They 

 formerly asked for High School train- 

 ing, and many still ask no more. But 

 other schools have demanded more and 

 more, till now one reqtiires a collegiate 

 bachelor's degree for entrance. The 

 situation is made still more serious for 

 medical students by the frequent post- 

 graduate hospital practice without ])ay. 

 It is time to call a halt. This cannot 

 go on without serious loss to the race. 

 Our young men should not have tluir 

 marriage postponed by external cir- 

 cumstances past 25 years. This means 

 we must allow students to sijecializc 

 earlier. If there is need of limiting the 

 number of candidates, let us have com- 

 petitive entrance examinations. We 

 must have our superior men marrying 

 earlier, even at some cost to their early 

 efliciency. The high eflTiciency of any 

 profession can be more safely kcjjt up 

 by demanding a minimum amount of 

 continuation work in afternoon, even- 

 ing or seasonal classes, laboratories or 

 clinics. No more graduate fellowships 

 should be established till those now 



existing carry a stipend adequate for 

 marriage. 



WHY WOMEN REMAIN SINGLE. 



Now we come to the consideration of 

 sexual selection in women. Are the 

 unmated inferior ? 



We do find some inferior individuals, 

 such as those unattractive in manner 

 and appearance, wholly as the result of 

 poor health. This may be either in- 

 herited or else the result of ignorance 

 frequently due to mental inferiority. 

 Others are unattractive because of the 

 absence of all sex feeling, or of some 

 l^hysical abnormality. And still others 

 are unmated because they have fallen 

 into ways of loose living, some as the 

 direct result of innate defects such as 

 feeble-mindedness, unusual susceptibil- 

 ity to suggestion, or sexual hyperes- 

 thesia. 



On the other hand, when we have 

 passed these groups of women, we find 

 large groups that are distinctly superior. 

 Some of these have had their chance of 

 marriage reduced by going to women's 

 colleges, others through engaging in 

 preeminently feminine occupations, such 

 as the teaching of children, yielding 

 meagre o]j]jortunities to associate with 

 men, or others through living in those 

 cities that have an undue proportion of 

 women. Then there are besides these, 

 superior women who, because they are 

 brought up in families without brothers 

 or brothers' friends, are so unnaturally 

 shy that they arc unable to become 

 friendh' with men, however much they 

 may care to. There are still others who 

 rei^el men by a manner of extreme self- 

 repression and coldness, sometimes the 

 result of parents' or teachers' over- 

 zealous efforts to inculcate modesty 

 and reserve, things valuable in due 

 degree, but bad in excess. 



In order to [^resent to you the serious- 

 ness of the situation I attach the results 

 of a study made by my student. Miss 

 Helen D. Murphey. This deals with 

 the graduates of Washington Seminary, 

 in Washington, Pennsylvania, a second- 

 ary school for women founded in 1837, 

 greatly antedating the first woman's 

 college which opened in 1865. \<>u will 



