HEREDITY AND ARRANGEMENT > ; 129 



the property and the dispute concerning it were 

 in England. 



It was obviously a most difficult and disputable 

 case, but the judge, a shrewd observer, noticed, 

 when the putative father was in the box, a feature 

 in his countenance which seemed closely to 

 resemble what was to be seen in the child which 

 he claimed to be his own. A careful examina- 

 tion of the parents and of the child was made by 

 an eminent sculptor, accustomed to minute ob- 

 servation of small features of variety in those 

 sitting to him as models. 



He reported and showed to the court that 

 there were remarkable features in the head of 

 the child which resembled, on the one hand an 

 unusual configuration in the mother or the 

 woman who claimed to be the mother and on 

 the other a well-marked feature in her husband. 

 And as a result the father and mother won their 

 case, and were proclaimed the parents of the child 

 because of the resemblance of these features ; 

 and, if we think for a moment, we shall see, be- 

 cause also of the reliance which the human race 

 has come to place in the fidelity of inheritance, 

 of its perfect certainty, so to speak, that a duck 

 will not come out of a hen's egg, and the fact of 

 this reliance on a generally received truth remains, 

 whatever may be said as to the legal aspect of 

 such evidence. 



Inheritance is a fact recognised by everybody, 

 and the only reason why we refuse to wonder 

 at it is because, like other wonderful yet everyday 

 facts, such as the growth of a great tree from a 



