tvith supernumerary Fingers and Toes. 19 



that more profound views and more applicable facts await the 

 researches of men, who have as yet only begun to explore this 

 branch of natural history, by subjecting it to physical rules. 



Though the causes which govern the production of organic 

 monstrosities, or which direct the hereditary continuance of 

 them, may for ever remain unknown, it still seems desirable to 

 ascertain the variety of those deviations, and to mark the course 

 they take, where they branch out anew, and where they ter- 

 minate. There is doubtless a general system in even the errors 

 of nature, as is abundantly evinced by the regular series of mon- 

 strosity exhibited both in animals and vegetables. 



It has happened in my professional capacity, that I have had 

 to extirpate a supernumerary thumb from each of the hands of 

 two girls, who were both idiots, though the families to whom 

 they belonged were unknown to each other. I have seen many 

 instances of sujjernumerary thumbs and supernumerary fingers 

 in persons to whom the singularity was not hereditary, and I 

 have read of many others j but whether of my own experience, 

 or of authentic record, the redundancy has been on the outer 

 side of the little finger, and outer side of the thumb, never on 

 the back or inside of the hand, or on the sides of the interme- 

 diate fingers: and in similar cases as to the toes, the rule has 

 been invariably the same. In the Sacred Writings an example 

 of this kind is given, II Samuel, ch. xxi. ver. 20. "And 

 there was yet a battle in Gath, where was a man oi great stature, 

 that had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, 

 four-and-twenty in number ; and he also was born to the giant." 

 The same account is repeated in I Chronicles, ch. xx. ver. 6. 



In the Elementa PkysiulogicB of Baron lialler, numerous 

 examples of this deformity are cited from various authors, with 

 some instances of their hereditary descent, and others of a 

 cutaneous junction between the extra limbs and the next ad- 

 joining*. 



That local resemblances, such as those of external parts, the 

 hands, the feet, the nose, the ears, and the eye-brows, are here- 

 ditary, is well known ; and it is almost equally evident, that 

 some parts of the ititernal structure are in like manner trans- 

 mitted by propagation: we frequently see a family form of the 

 legs and joints, which gives a peculiar gait, and a family cha- 

 racter of the shoulders, both of which are derived from an he- 

 reditary similarity in the skeletons. Family voices are also very 

 common, ami are ascribable to a similar cause. Apparently 

 many of our English surnames have been taken from the here- 

 ditary peculiarities of families, and the same practice existed 



• Vide vol. viii. p. 98, 



B 2 among 



