i6 A REPLY TO CRITICISMS OF THE 



showed them that his " physique "," intelligence ", ''wage- 

 earning capacity", and "efficiency", are at least equal to 

 that of a sober parent ' {B. M. jf., p. 77). 



This statement is an entire perversion of the whole wage 

 question as discussed by us. It is an example, very apt, of 

 what, citing from Herbert Spencer, Dr. Hyslop in his address 

 to the Society for the Study of Inebriety the other night 

 termed the child making a hopeless tangle of a skein of silk. 

 The unwary reader will hardly realize that this question of 

 wages occupied just thirty-three lines on p. 4, and three 

 lines on p. 31, of the original memoir of forty-six pages ! It 

 was no 'chief generalization ' at all, but was used merely as a 

 supplementary investigation to settle a doubt which arose 

 early in our minds. When we were at an early stage of our 

 work, we confidently expected to be able to demonstrate 

 a sensible influence of parental alcoholism on the mentality 

 and physique of the offspring.^ But we determined to guard 

 against possible sources of error arising from a differentiation 

 of our two classes of parents ab initio, i. e. before the outset 

 of the drinking. If any critic could show that the alcohol 

 using section of our inquiry belonged to a feebler stock ab 

 initio, i. e. before they took to alcohol, then the inferior 

 health of their offspring might not be due to their parents' 

 alcohol, but to their parents' stock. To discover whether 

 the parent originally belonged to an inferior stock was the 

 fundamental purpose of our wage inquiry. Any one \yho 

 will read p. 4 of our original memoir must perceive how this 

 point, not a study of the economic value of the alcoholic, 

 was the source of our inquiry. The following words will 

 explain the whole position : 



^ See p. 31 of our Memoir. It was the absence of this sensible influence 

 which led Miss Elderton in her lecture to use the word 'startling,', which 

 appears to amuse Dr. Sturge and Sir Victor Horsley ! 



