174 THE MENDEL JOURNAL 



insanity has been known in each generation for several 

 generations, some sons and daughters are sane and 

 others are insane ; that sane parents may produce 

 insane offspring; that in famiHes where "hooliganism"' 

 exists and can be traced at least in two generations, 

 there can be found in the same generation of brothers 

 and sisters some who are hooligans and others who 

 are respectable and hard-working persons ? I am 

 speaking from personal knowledge derived from 

 investigations not yet complete, and I find it impossible 

 to fall in line with Miss Wodehouse's attitude. If 

 these things occur in the same parentage, and an 

 abnormal feature may be regarded as "a unit- 

 character," why not the other, which appears to 

 be its alternative character ? 



Miss Wodehouse has attributed to me an attitude 

 in regard to mental unit-characters, which as a 

 cautious man of science, I did not adopt, and which 

 I was very careful to avoid. But since she has raised 

 the question, I am not at all averse to discussing it on 

 general grounds. I would like, however, to say, for 

 the interest of those who are not conversant with 

 Mendelian methods, that a general discussion is 

 not Mendelism, but is of a converse nature. I am 

 now merely concerned in dealing with certain 

 theoretical considerations. 



Miss Wodehouse says that she cannot regard 

 those qualities which we praise or blame in sane men 

 as being due to simple hereditary units. Now, how 

 is it possible to test this question of the existence 

 of unit- characters in human mental life ? By 



