226 Life and Letters of Francis Galton 



of blood or size of thyroid gland, etc. — which, without being a "faculty," 

 might tend to throw light on hereditary processes in man. I have therefore 

 ventured to place on record here that to the best of my knowledge and 

 belief Galton, by the use of the term "faculties" in the Codicil of 1909, 

 in no wise wished to set any limitation on the definition of Eugenics which 

 he fully accepted in his Memories of 1908 (p. 321). 



(4) The Huxley Lecture of 1901, and Allied Matters. Before entering 

 into more detail as to the steps Galton took to develop the research side 

 and the popular side of Eugenics, it may be convenient to pass under review 

 the publications which he issued in this last period of his life. It is true 

 that they were written more from the popular standpoint than his earlier 

 papers on statistics and heredity, but they lacked little of the old fire, and 

 were eminently suited to his purpose, viz. that of creating a national movement 

 in favour of a eugenic policy. His work may best be reviewed in chronological 

 order, thus forming a history of the last eleven years of his life, 1901 to 1911, 

 from his 79th to 89th year. We have seen* that in the winter of 1900 Galton 

 was in Egypt and spoke before the Khedivial Society for Geography on the 

 Egypt of 1846 f and of 1900. On his return in 1901, he was invited to give 

 the Huxley Lecture and receive the Huxley medal of the Royal Anthro- 

 pological Institute. Tbese events took place on October 29th %, and the lecture, 

 entitled "The possible Improvement of the Human Breed under the existing 

 Conditions of Law and Sentiment," was published in Nature, Nov. 1, 1901, 

 and again in the Report of the Smithsonian Institution, pp. 523-538. It seems 

 to have been published only in abstract by the Anthropological Institute. It 

 is noteworthy that Galton in his early days tried to induce the physical 

 anthropologists of that Institute to adopt a scientific technique. In his old 

 age he endeavoured to prove to them that a study of racial characters finds 

 its practical outcome in the art of Eugenics. In neither case was he really 

 successful. It is the Eugenics Laboratories springing up over Europe which 

 are adopting anthropology as an auxiliary science and revivifying its technique 

 and aims ; it is the older institutes of anthropology which have not grasped 

 that their study of the evolution of man's past has for its main purpose the 

 direction of man's future — therein alone it finds its full justification. 



Galton opened his Huxley Lecture by stating that he proposed to treat 

 broadly a new topic belonging to a class in which Huxley himself would have 

 felt a keen interest. He had accordingly selected a topic, which had occupied 

 his thoughts for many years, and to which a large part of his published 

 inquiries had borne a direct though silent reference. His remarks would 

 serve as an additional chapter to his books on Hereditary Genius and Natural 

 Inheritance, and we may add also to his Inquiry into Human Faculty, wherein 

 he first defined and used the term "Eugenics," and talked of the possible 

 purposeful improvement of the human breed§. 



* See the present volume, p. 158. 



t Actually 1845-6: see our Vol. I, pp. 198-205. 



% With Lord Avebury (formerly Sir John Lubbock) in the chair, a very fit choice. 



§ See our Vol. n, pp. 252, 264 et seq. 



