in.] ORIGIN OF TASTE FOR SCIENCE. 197 



tion to be 1 case of inheritance to 4 that are 

 not inherited from either parent. There is no 

 case in which the correspondent speaks of having 

 inherited a love of science from his mother, 

 though, of course, she may, and probably has, 

 often transmitted it from a grand-parent. I 

 have a curious case among the returns sent to 

 me of a passion for heraldry characterising a 

 great-nephew and a great-uncle, the latter of 

 whom had died before the former was born. 

 I have another of an eminent statistician, in 

 whom a love of figures and tabulation was 

 highly characteristic of his grand-parent and is 

 very strongly marked in himself, but was wholly 

 absent in his parent and all other known mem- 

 bers of his small family. There have been 

 numerous and most curious cases of a love 

 of figures and tabulation in my own family, 

 which richly deserve a full description. It was 

 carried to so strange an extravagance by one 

 of its members, a lady now deceased, that I 

 can do no sufficient justice to her peculiarities 

 by speaking in general terms ; I ought to give 

 pages of anecdote. 



