114 TH E FEEBLY INHIBITED. 



cares whether she lives or dies, and, on one occasion, she had to be 

 watched all night lest she take her life. 



In family B (13:39) the propositus had an unfortunate love affair, 

 worried over her two insane sibs, lost sleep, and became depressed. 

 She made one attempt on her life and threatened another. One day 

 she wandered away from home and was found lying in the snow trying 

 to freeze; she was sent to a hospital and seemed greatly depressed. 



In family 13 (41 : 25) we have more than one case of suicide connected 

 with depression. A successful man about 35 years old, a millionaire 

 whose business was prospering, whose family affairs were devoid of 

 difficulties, and who had no physical complaint, became depressed for 

 days at a time. Finally he tried to take his life by hanging, but was 

 found in time and was thereafter kept under constant watch. His 

 father had also attempted suicide. A brother of this father, a leader 

 in every good town movement, when past middle age became sad at 

 times with no apparent cause and would remain in a depressed, quiet 

 state for days at a time. Though carefully watched, he escaped one 

 day and, lying face downward in a pool of water, drowned himself. 

 Such histories are very common among men of past middle age suffering 

 from melancholia. 



The cases cited in the preceding paragraph are instructive, since 

 they illustrate the condition that is frequently found of alternating 

 hyperactivity and depression in the same individual at different times 

 in his life. It is, indeed, conceivable that the same individual should 

 at one time attempt suicide while in a hyperkinetic state, and later, in 

 a depressed state, actually kill himself. But the suicide occurs in one 

 state or the other, or in an hysterical, impulsive state that is allied to 

 the hyperkinetic. 



4. THE INHERITANCE OF THESE TWO TYPES OF SUICIDES. 



We have just seen that usually suicides occur in particular states and 

 probably only in such, either in an impulsive or hyperkinetic state or, 

 on the other hand, in a depressed state. The state permits the suicide, 

 but does not absolutely control it. In some families, to be sure, like 

 No. 13 (41:25), it seems as though a specific tendency to suicide is 

 inherited. However, since it is impossible to consider as inheritable 

 units all the different shades of success or failure of suicidal attempts, 

 we shall do best, I think, to consider the inheritance of the states 

 themselves in which the impulses occur. 



Inheritance of the Tendency to Commit .Suicide while in the Hyperkinetic State. 



An examination of 40 histories of families in which the prevailing 

 mood is, for most persons in the family, one of hyperkinesis, shows 

 that the hyperkinetic disposition rarely skips a generation. It can not 

 infrequently be traced back through three generations, and this is about 

 as far as the memory of man extends. In the case of family 11 (13:272) 



