INTELLECTUAL AND MORAL HEREDITY 39 



^he hereditary character of musical talent is 

 well known. Allegri, author of the " Miserere," 

 was of the same family as Correggio the painter, 

 and the artistic talents are probably radically one, 

 whether they be manifested in rh3^thm, in colour, 

 or in sweet sounds. Andrea Amati was only the 

 most illustrious member of a family of violinists 

 at Cremona ; Mozart's father was a violinist ; 

 Beethoven was the son of a tenor singer ; and 

 Mendelssohn was of a musical family. The Bachs 

 supply perhaps the most distinguished instance of 

 mental heredity on record. The family began in 

 1550, and lasted through eight generations, to the 

 year 1800. During a period of nearly two hun- 

 dred years it produced a number of artists of the 

 first rank. There is no other instance of so many^ 

 remarkable talents in a single family. Its head 

 was Weit Bach, a baker of Presburg, who used 

 to seek relaxation from labour in music and song. 

 He had two sons, who commenced the unbroken 

 line of musicians of the same name that, for nearly 

 two centuries, may be said to have overrun Thu- 

 ringia, Saxony, and Franconia. They were all 

 organists or church singers. When they had be- 

 come too numerous to live near each other, and 

 the members of the family were scattered abroad, 

 they resolved to meet once a year on a stated day, 



