A POLYDACTYLOUS FAMILY 



ItlniTn S. Atwood axd Clara P. Poxd. 



IT'S pretty hard to find shoes to fit 

 liim," admitted the father of the 

 4-year-old boy shown in the frontis- 

 piece of this issue. His extra <j;reat 

 toe ]3rojects so far from the normal line 

 of the foot that the shoe tisually hurts 

 him. But the father is reconciled to 

 this slij^ht inconvenience, for he is tre- 

 mendoush' proud of the polydactyl 

 tendency of his oft"si)rin^. Ou^ht he 

 not to feel triumjjhant, when there are 

 still "shows" which will pa>' money to 

 obtain abnormalities of this sort for 

 exhibition ? 



There was a little girl in the family, 

 now dead, who had one extra thumb. 

 The next child, a boy, now about 2 

 years old, had one little sui)ernumerar>- 

 projecting from his right thumb. It 

 has been recently removed. The baby, 

 l)orn in 1916, also a boy, has an extra 

 thumb on each hand, and an extra 

 great toe on each foot, exactly like the 

 4-year-old boy. 



The father has two left thumbs, and 

 double great toes on both feet. The 

 extra thumb, he contends, is a con- 

 venience, since in manual work, if he 

 hurts one thumb, he can close the other 

 about his tools. 



The father has a sister who has no 

 extra digits, but has an extra joint in 

 both thumbs, the left one being anky- 

 losed. The double joint on the right 



hand she can bend down and in, thus 

 l)eing able to pull harder than an ordin- 

 ary- ])erson. She has one daughter who 

 is normal. 



Another sister of the father had a 

 rudimentarv^ thumb removed from her 

 right hand, at the first joint. In her 

 left thumb the bones from the lower 

 joint are double, but separate. She 

 has single toes. She has two sons and 

 two daughters, normal, with normal 

 children, and another son whose second 

 and third right fingers are webbed. A 

 fleshy growth was recently removed 

 from the second joint of one finger of 

 his right hand, on account of the danger 

 of its being caught in machinery. 



Two brothers and one sister of the 

 father were normal and have normal 

 children. 



The remaining brother, according to 

 the informant, had extra great toes on 

 both feet. The traits of his children 

 are unknown. 



The father's father had normal toes 

 and a normal right thumb, but his 

 left thumb was double jointed. There 

 is no history of any abnormality of 

 digits in the family of the father's 

 mother. 



The mother of the boy photographed 

 has normal fingers and toes, as have all 

 her immediate family, and all relatives 

 so far as they know. 



The Elementary Biology of Sex 



THE WAV LIFE BEGLXS, an Inlroduc- 

 tion to vSex Education, by Bertha Chajjman 

 Cady and Vernon Mosher Cady, with fore- 

 \v(jrd t)y Wilham Freeman Snow, NLD. Pp. 7X. 

 with 10 text figures and 9 colored jilates. .New 

 ^■ork, American Social Hygiene Association. 

 lO.S West Fortieth Street, 1916. Price. SI. 00. 



Parents and teachers who desire to 

 instruct children in the biology of 

 reprofluction are often ill instructed on 

 the subject themselves, and find it 

 (linicult to get just the information they 



need. The above book should meet 

 this need satisfactorily. It discusses 

 frankly but delicately the subject of 

 rei)r()(luction in the lily, moth, fish, frog, 

 fowl, rabbit and man, and devotes 

 attention to the general function of 

 sex in evolution. The treatment is 

 elementary but ftiU and clear, and free 

 from the sentimentality which dis- 

 figures many works on the subject. The 

 book is heartily recommended. 



