364 TJfe and Jjetter» of Francis (Uilton 



Tlie whole work is prefaced with an account by Galton of how the Record 

 should be fillet! in. It contains many characteristic statements. A few of 

 these may be cited here, as the book is very scarce. 



•"niw book ia designed for those who care to forecast the mental and bodily faculties of 

 their children, and to further the science of heredity. Tlie natural j^ifts of each individual 

 being inherite<l from his ancestry, it is possible to foresee much of the latent capacities of a 

 child in mind and body, of the probabilitita of his future health and longevity, and of his 

 tendenciea to special forms of disease, by a knowledge of his ancestral precetlents. When the 

 science <rf heredity shall have become more advanced, the accuracy of such forecasts will doubt- 

 less improve; in the meantime we may rest assured that fewer blunders will bo made in 

 rearing and educating children, under the guidance of a knowledge of their family unt<'cedent8, 

 Uuin without it." 



In the third paragraph Galton rightly points out that it is needful to 

 study as many ancestral lines as possible, and that the book gives no 

 countenance to the vanity that prompts most family historians to trace 

 their pedigree to some notable ancestor and to paas over the rest in silence. 

 Galton remarks that 



"one ancestor who lived at the time of the Norman Conquest, twenty-four generations back, 

 contributes (on the supposition of no intermarriage of kinsfolk) less than one part in 16,000,000 

 to the constitution of a man of the present day." (p. 1.) 



This is rather a theoretical than an observational result. It is true a man 

 may have 20 to 30 generations back 16,000,000 direct line ancestors if so 

 many were available, but it is equally true that a distinguished man of that 

 day might have several million descendants, and, if any system of alternative 

 or factorial inheritance be true, the distinguished individuals among those 

 descendants may owe their nature to that distinguished ancestor. It does 

 mean something to trace even in one line — and there are four or five — a link 

 lictween Darwin or Galton and Alfred the Great. It signifies nothing to 

 trace the same link between a mediocrity and Alfred the Great'. Galton 

 suggests that we need not go back beyond our great-grandparents, and this 

 is absolutely true of characters which blend. But when he tells us that if 

 an alien element of race or disease has been introduced into a family — a touch 

 of Hebrew, of Huguenot (or even negroid) blood — it may be traced far further, 

 he seems to me to he contradicting his previous statement. Albinism for 

 example may remain latent through far more than three generations. But 

 Galton recognises fully this latency at other points. 



"Brothers and sisters are alike in bhxxl, but it commonly happens that one of them 

 exhibits some faculty in a con.spicuouB degree, which exists only in a latent form in another, 

 and which the latt«r is, perhaps, equally capable of transmitting to his children. Therefore 

 records of the faculties of the brothers and sisters of direct ancestors are of great value in 

 disclosing hidden characteristics." (p. 2.) 



I think it would be more just to say that the limitation to great-grand- 

 parents is only a (juestion of the limitation of knowledge in the case of most 

 families ; and without being conclusive a great deal may still be learnt, if wt- 



' The illustration can be given in another form: Some 15 years ago pielmldism appeared 

 'iiy Htirp of dogs and soon disappeared. After 7 or 8 generations it has reappeared. The 

 i lid ancestor means little to tlie average dog of my stock; he means everything to tht- 

 ted piebald puppies of to-day. 



