THE MEDICAL EVIDENCE 



75 



to be, on the average, as liable to gout as the scions of the 

 aristocracy. 



117. In haemophilia the blood lacks coagulating power ; there- 

 fore the flow from a wound in a ' bleeder/ as a sufferer from the 

 disease is colloquially termed, is difficult to staunch. The 

 condition is always an innate, a nutritional character, and, as 

 such, is reproduced by offspring. Often, however, it is spoken of 

 as ' acquired ' by the parent, and inherited by the child. 



1 1 8. On the other hand, syphilis is due to a microbe that 

 multiplies in the body, and may pass from the parent to the germ- 

 cell, embryo, or fcetus, precisely as it may pass to an adult 

 individual. It is no more inherited than a bullet which pierces 

 a mother and enters her foetus. The microbe elaborates a poison, 

 a 'toxin,' which likewise passes into the child with the nutrient 

 fluids, and so may injure it. This injury also is never inherited ; 

 it is always an acquirement. 1 



1 19. Medical men see innumerable mutilations. Sometimes 

 very rarely indeed a child is born with a deformity which bears 

 some resemblance to the parental mutilation. Thereupon the 

 inheritance of the latter is alleged, the possibility of coincidence 

 being ignored. The evidence is of the same nature and not 

 intrinsically superior to that which causes some people to believe 

 in prophetic dreams. 



1 20. Deformities, mutilations, and the like are so common 

 as to be observed frequently by every one. If a pregnant woman 

 observes one, and bears a normal child, no notice is taken of the 

 fact ; but if the child is deformed she is apt to attribute the 

 misfortune to a maternal impression. Medical men have thought 

 it worth while to collect and publish many instances of such 

 happenings. But " Dr William Hunter, in the last century, told 

 my father that during many years every woman in a large lying-in 

 hospital was asked before her confinement whether anything had 

 especially affected her mind, and the answer was written down ; 

 and it so happened that in no instance could a coincidence be 

 detected between the woman's answer and any abnormal structure ; 

 but when she knew the nature of the structure she frequently 

 suggested a fresh cause." 2 



121. Telegony is the term applied to the alleged influence of a 

 previous sire. Thus if a woman bears two children, the first to a 



1 For a more detailed discussion of the evidence furnished by syphilis, see 

 416-8. 



2 Darwin, Animals and Plants, vol. ii. pp. 252-3. 



