20 Account of u Family with supernumerary Fingers and Toes, 



among the Romans: Pliny, in his eleventh book, chap, xliii. 

 relates an instance of a Roman poet, named Volcatius, who had 

 six fingers on each hand, and received the surname oi Sedigitus 

 in conse(|uence. He .also states, that two daughters^of a noble 

 Roman, named M. Curiatins, had each six fingers, and that 

 they took the snrname of Sedigitae. Persons who had the sur- 

 name of I'laccus were so called from their pendulous ears ; and 

 numerous other instances are recorded by classic writers of sur- 

 names being derived from family marks. 



Anatomical researches have not been so generally extended 

 as to determine the prevalence of internal peculiarities, and per- 

 haps they do not reach to the sanguineous system. I have 

 known two instances, in two different families, of the high di- 

 vision of the brachial arteries having the idnar branch placed 

 above the fascia of the biceps muscle at the inner bend of the 

 elbows, and yet the father, the mother, the brothers and sisters 

 of those two persons were not so formed. Those marks caUed 

 7icevi matenii, which are derangements of the sanguineous ves- 

 sels, are not hereditary, whilst less remarkable changes in the 

 ordinary skin are often so. I have lately seen a man, and who 

 is now living, who has a small pendulous fold attached to the 

 skin of his upper eyelid, and the same peculiarity has been 

 transmitted to his four children. It would have been interesting 

 to know, whether any similarity of structure existed in the fa- 

 milies of the two rare examples of a total transposition of 

 the abdominal and thoracic viscera. (Phil. Trans, for 1674, 

 No. cvii. p. 146, by Dr. Sampson, and vol. Ixxviii. p. 350.) 



In particular breeds of animals, the characteristic signs are 

 generally continued, whether they belong to the horns of kine, 

 the fleeces of sheep, the proportions of horses, the extensive va- 

 rieties of dogs, or the ears of swine. In China the varieties gf 

 gold and silver fishes are carefully propagated, and with us, 

 what are vulgarly called " fancy pigeons" are bred into most 

 whimsical deviations from their parent stock. 



As wild animals and plants are not liable to the same varia- 

 tions, and as all the variations seem to increase with the degree 

 of artificial restraint imposed, and as certain animals become 

 adapted by extraordinary changes to extraordiunry conditions, 

 it may still be expected that some leading fact v.'ill eventually 

 furnish a clue, by which or.7anic varieties may be better ex- 

 plained. A few generations of wild rabbits, or of pheasants 

 under the influences of confinement, break their natural colours, 

 and leave the fur and feathers of tlieir future progeny uncertainly 

 variegated. The very remarkable changes of the colour of 

 the fur of the ha>e, and the feathers of the partridge, in high 

 northern latitudes, during the prevalence of the snow, and the 



adaptation 



