THROWING BACK 113 



in childhood. Of the remainder two are intelligent 

 and marry, but are childless. The third is deformed. 

 The fourth is eccentric and extravagant. The fifth 

 has fits of insanity. B leaves no issue. C has one 

 child who is imbecile and hermaphrodite. D has a 

 son who dies of apoplexy at twenty-three ; another 

 child of D's is imbecile, and a third is an artist, de- 

 scribed as "extravagant." E has a son who dies 

 insane, and a daughter who disappears and is supposed 

 to commit suicide. F is childless. G has one child 

 who is semi-imbecile.'^ 



It is to be observed that this radically unsound 

 family, although prolific to begin with, becomes 

 extinct in the third generation. Another point of 

 interest in the case is that deformity, hermaphroditism, 

 and apoplexy are among the evils developed from 

 insanity. Doutrebente's observations lead him to the 

 belief that insanity introduced into a family by one 

 parent may be worked out of it by the infusion of 

 healthy blood, but that the offspring of two affected 

 parents is doomed to extinction. There is no doubt 

 but that suicide is Nature's great remedy for insanity 

 when death by other means does not supervene, and 

 it is a question whether the philanthropy is well 



^ Annales Mcdico-Psychologiques, 1869. 

 I 



