INBREEDING. 103 



was a very superior animal." It would seem 

 that this high character was secured at rather 

 a high cost. The only pig of a litter to begin 

 with; partly infertile so much so that had not 

 the in-and-in system been abandoned precipi- 

 tately she would have been the last of her line; 

 a barren sow in all practical senses; the one 

 fine animal out of all that company of the 

 dead-born, the impotent, the idiotic, the halt 

 and infirm. Truly a costly beast to breed. 



A recent writer in commenting on this case 

 advances the following ingenious theory*: 

 "That the procreative powers were not de- 

 stroyed, but remained latent, is shown by the 

 fact that the sows bred freely with the boars of 

 another family. With boars of their own blood 

 they could not be expected to breed, as the pow- 

 ers of fecundity in such case would be latent in 

 both male and female; but when they were 

 bred with animals in which the reproductive 

 function was not latent the defect was cor- 

 rected." Latent, or impaired almost to the de- 

 gree of total destruction, the case most admir- 

 ably illustrates the fact that Nature has placed 

 a barrier beyond which in-and-in breeding can- 

 not be carried. This case illustrates well some 

 of the most important facts of in-and-in breed- 

 ing. It shows absolutely the extreme tendency 

 to physical and mental decay; it shows this 



* Prof. Manly Miles in "Stock-Breeding," page 169. 



