MENTAL CHARACTERS IN MAN 153 



organism of low intellect and strong physique. They 

 often have exceptional strength, but cannot show 

 it on a dynamometer because of lack of will power. 

 They represent a more primitive type, with dullness 

 to pain, etc., but under exceptional conditions they 

 may perform surprising feats of strength. 



Sedgwick (1861, 1863) records many instances of 

 the inheritance of insane diatheses. In one familv 

 (Fig. 29) hereditary imbecility appears in nearly 

 all the females of two generations, while the sons 

 were normal. No. II. 3 was eccentric and silly, 

 while No. II. 11, though not an imbecile, was a 

 religious fanatic and became a Mormon. 



Inspection of charts does not convince one that 

 insanity in the ancestry has any potent influence 

 towards causing feeblemindedness. On the other 

 hand, the feebleminded not infrequently have insane 

 offspring. Insanity is a symptom of nervous de- 

 rangement which will occasionally give rise to feeble- 

 mindedness. Thus, Goddart cites the case of Nora T., 

 age thirteen years, mentality three. Her father and 

 mother were both normal, but the feeblemindedness 

 in the father's family and the insanit}^ in the mother's 

 family apparently brought about the result in Nora. 

 Again, Bessie X. has a cousin who is epileptic and 

 a number of distant relatives who are insane or 

 epileptic, while others are " queer "or'' peculiar." vShe 

 is fifteen, with a mentality of two, and her condition 

 is looked upon as a summing-up of various morbid 

 tendencies which have appeared sporadically in 

 several generations of her ancestors. 



It is worth noting that the drawings of animals 

 by the feebleminded sometimes remind one in style 

 and method of some of the cave drawings of early man. 



While feeblemindedness is certainl}' far removed 

 from genius in the mental scale, representing a 

 primitive undeveloped mental condition, it is often 



