3 



88 Heredity. 



As regards those passions which have their origin in the desire 

 of eating, it is impossible to cite facts to prove their heredity so 

 remarkably. Gluttony and voracity seldom lead to such deplor- 

 able results as alcoholism. It is not, however, difficult to find 

 families in which voracity is inherited. This has been observed in 

 the Bourbons. Saint-Simon informs us that Louis XIV. was a 

 man of extraordinary greediness, and the same was the case with 

 his brother. Nearly all this king's sons were gourmands and great 

 eaters, and this passion has been transmitted to their descendants. 



A more curious case, and one comparable to alcoholism, owing 

 to its morbid character, is the fact of cannibalism which we have 

 elsewhere cited, on the authority of Gall, Lordat, and Prosper 

 Lucas. These authors tell of a Scotch family possessed of an 

 instinctive propensity to cannibalism, which persisted through 

 several generations : sundry members of this family paid the 

 penalty of this with their lives, and others had to be placed under 

 surveillance. 1 



It is probable that the children of cannibals, brought up in 

 Europe, would exhibit the like tendencies in the midst of our 

 civilization. Although no facts of this kind are recorded, it must 

 be admitted that the incurable love of a wandering life manifested 

 by these civilized savages, and their inability to adapt themselves 

 to our usages instances of which will elsewhere be given 2 some- 

 what justify these presumptions. 



Earth-eating, which A. von Humboldt met with in all tropical 

 countries, presents a curious instance of morbid heredity. ' The 

 people,' says this naturalist, ' have an odd and almost irresistible 

 liking for a kind of greasy potter's clay with a strong, unpleasant 

 smell. The children have often to be locked up to prevent them 

 from running out after recent rain and eating clay.' He states 

 that the women who are engaged in the potteries on the Rio 

 Magdalena swallow great lumps of clay. At the mission of San 

 Barjo, he saw an Indian child who, according to the statement of 

 its mother, would hardly eat anything but earth ; the child, in con- 

 sequence, looked like a skeleton. The negroes of Guinea have 

 the same propensity ; they swallow a yellowish kind of earth which 



, i. 391, 497. * See Part Fourth, ch. H. 



