THE PROBLEM OF VICE AND CRIME 



175 



Crothers finds the cause of about one-fourth of all 

 inebriety. 



But the influence on succeeding generations of 

 evil habit — or its equivalent in the form of disease 

 — goes farther than the formation of a tendency to 

 alcoholism. Of the group called by Dr. Crothers 

 " complex border-land cases," or those where an- 

 cestors have been victims of diseases which tend 

 toward the drink-habit, or to conditions which 

 favour it, he says, not only that "fully one-fourth 

 of all inebriates are of this class," but also 

 that, " in these cases there seems to be in certain 

 families a regular cycle of degenerative diseases. 

 Thus in one generation great eccentricity, genius, 

 and a high order of emotional development. . . . 

 In the next generation insane, inebriates, feeble- 

 minded, or idiots. In the third generation pau- 

 pers, criminals, tramps, epileptics, idiots, insane, 

 consumptives, and inebriates. In the fourth 

 generation they die out, or may swing back to 

 great genius, pioneers and heroes, or leaders of 

 extreme movements." The study of a large num- 

 ber of inebriates shows both mental and physical 

 legacies of evil from parents. " Bad-shaped heads 

 and bodies, retarded or excessive growth, club 

 feet, cleft palate, defective eyesight, great gross- 

 ness of organization, or extreme frailty of develop- 



