RECORD OF FAMILY FACULTIES. 



Ancestors already described. The first might contain page, initials, 

 height, and colour of hair; thus: — 12, F.N. short, v. dark. In this way 

 a general view will be obtained of the variety of racial characteristics 

 in the ancestry ; how far the breed is pure, and how far mixed. 



A second summary might be of page, initials, disease or cause of 

 death, and age at death ; thus : — 16 A.B. apoplexy, d. 56. 



Other summaries may be added at' the discretion of the writer. 

 These synoptic views of the family will be usually found to bring its 

 biological unity into startling relief It is impossible after looking at many 

 of them, to doubt that a knowledge of ancestral precedents enables a 

 far more accurate forecast to be made of the future of a child than 

 would be otherwise possible. 



Appendices. The book closes with three appendices. 



I. On the biological history and hereditary peculiarities of mind and 

 body on the father's side of the family. 



II. Similarly on the mother's side. 



III. An examination of the way in which the faculties of the 

 father and mother are blended or otherwise combined in the child. 



The inquiries I wish to set in motion by means of this publication, 

 throughout many families, are such as relatives and friends will gladly 

 assist in making. The memories of ladies are excellent repositories of 

 personal matters, dates, and other details ; a family inquiry greatly 

 interests them, and they are zealous correspondents. Whatever may be 

 the value of the results, the facts incidentally obtained during the course of 

 the inquiry will form a separate document much prized by all the family. 



The scientific importance of each investigation will, however, be soon 

 appreciated by the author of it, for his researches will lay bare many far- 

 reaching biological bonds that tie his family into a connected whole, whose 

 existence was previously little suspected. Few, if any, have seriously studied 

 the facts of heredity without becoming impressed with the conviction that 

 no man stands on an isolated basis, but that he is a prolongation of his 

 ancestry in no metaphorical sense, and I shall be surprised if the com- 

 pilation of these registers does not extend this conviction very widely. 



FRANCIS GALTON. 

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