184 PRINCIPLES OF STOCK-BREEDING. 



one hundred cases no report is given as to the health 

 or habits of the parents. 



The mere fact that the parents of these defective 

 children were related, throws no light upon the cause 

 of their infirmities, which can only be determined bj 

 a knowledge of details that the report does not fur- 

 nish. 



Dr. Robert Newman, of New York, as chairman 

 of a committee appointed for that purpose, made a 

 " Report on the Result of Consanguineous Marriages" 

 to the New York State Medical Society, from which 

 we make the following extracts, showing the opinions 

 of able men who have given the subject a careful ex- 

 amination, and a summary of the results of the in- 

 quiries made by the committee. 



Dr. Gilbert Child says, " The marriages of blood 

 relations have no tendency, per se, to produce degen- 

 eration of race." 



Prof. S. H. Dickson, of Philadelphia, in his lect- 

 ures on "Scrofulosis and Tuberculosis," makes the 

 following statement : " Several writers on both sides 

 of the Atlantic on this side Prof. Bemis ascribe 

 much of tuberculosis and scrofulosis to the marrying 

 of relatives physical incest, as it is called. I think 

 the truth can be put in a nutshell. I suggest it to 

 you, there is a great deal of exaggeration on this sub- 

 ject, yet there is much reason for the belief that the 

 intermarriage of relatives is dangerous to the offspring, 

 not on account of their mere consanguinity, but be- 

 cause they are likely to have the same predisposition 

 to scrofula, if that predisposition exists in that family. 

 . . . Therefore we come to the conclusion that it is 



