WHAT WE MIGHT EXPECT. 1S9 



I feel inclined to say it is not merely the original 

 wound that is remembered, but the whole process of 

 cure which is now accordingly repeated. Brown Sequard 

 concludes, as Mr. Darwin tells us, " that what is trans- 

 mitted is the morbid state of the nervous system," due 

 to the operation performed on the parents. 



A little lower down Mr. Darwin writes that Pro- 

 fessor Eolleston has given him two cases — " namely, of 

 two men, one of whom had his knee, and the other his 

 cheek, severely cut, and both had children born with 

 exactly the same spot marked or scarred." 



VI. When, however, an impression has once reached 

 transmission point — whether it be of the nature of a 

 sudden striking thought, which makes its mark deeply 

 then and there, or whether it be the result of smaller 

 impressions repeated until the nail, so to speak, has been 

 driven home — we should expect that it should be remem- 

 bered by the offspring as something which he has done 

 all his life, and which he has therefore no longer any 

 occasion to learn ; he will act, therefore, as people say, 

 instinctively. No matter how complex and difficult the 

 process, if the parents have done it sufficiently often 

 (that is to say, for a sufficient number of generations), 

 the offspring will remember the fact when association 

 wakens the memory ; it will need no instruction, and 

 — unless when it has been taught to look for it during 

 many generations — will expect none. This may be 

 seen in the case of the humming-bird sphinx moth, 

 which, as Mr. Darwin writes, " shortly after its emer- 

 gence from the cocoon, as shown by the bloom on its 

 unruffled scales, may be seen poised stationary in the 



