Essays on Life 



stood is nowhere manifested more clearly than 

 in Dr. Francis Darwin's life of his father. In 

 this work Lamarck is sneered at once or 

 twice, and told to go away, but there is no 

 attempt to state the two cases side by side ; 

 from which, as from not a little else, I con- 

 clude that Dr. Francis Darwin has de- 

 scended from his father with singularly little 

 modification. 



Proceeding to the evidence for the trans- 

 misions of acquired habits, I will quote two 

 recently adduced examples from among the 

 many that have been credibly attested. The 

 first was contributed to Nature (March 14, 

 1889) by Professor Marcus M. Hartog, who 

 wrote : 



" A. B. is moderately myopic and very 

 astigmatic in the left eye ; extremely myopic 

 in the right. As the left eye gave such bad 

 images for near objects, he was compelled in 

 childhood to mask it, and acquired the habit 

 of leaning his head on his left arm for writing, 

 so as to blind that eye, or of resting the left 

 temple and eye on the hand, with the elbow 



on the table. At the age of fifteen the eyes 



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