152 MARRIAGE AND DISEASE. 



that is, they showed no symptoms of syphilis. In 

 these three families there were twenty-two children, 

 and of these only one grew up to healthy maturity. 

 Five were premature, three died of inflammation of 

 the membranes of the brain before attaining their 

 second year, two were imbecile, two were idiotic, one 

 had numerous signs of degeneration, one was weak in 

 intellect, one insane, two hysterical, one epileptic, one 

 a deaf-mute, and two had water on the brain. Of the 

 thirteen still alive when these statistics were taken, 

 eight were incapable of earning their living, the re- 

 maining five being sickly and nervous. All three 

 families, he points out, were of the respectable com- 

 mercial class; none of the children were exposed to 

 the hardships which, in the case of peasants and 

 artisans, may cause infantile diseases falsely attributed 

 to syphilis. Dr. Tarnowsky has collected other family 

 histories scarcely less dreadful, and his conclusion is, 

 that syphilis in a parent may be the cause of a long 

 series of most serious diseases scrofula, rickets, 

 nervous disorders, &c., and the offspring at the best 

 are often weak, useless members of society. 



All syphilitic children are ill- developed, miserable, 

 puny things even when not deformed. Their little faces 

 are withered, pale, and pinched ; their noses become flat, 

 their heads are large, their foreheads square, their cheeks 

 seared with the scars of old sores ; and over all there 

 is a strange uncanny look of age and suffering which 

 is repulsive, and strangely at variance with the cherub- 

 like freshness and innocence of the healthy infant. 



