AS TO THTi; HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CONDITTOKS. 485 



(6) "More deeply situated organs, the very existence of which 

 may be unknown to the pregnant woman, may be malformed ; as, 

 for instance, the heart, the intestinal tube, &c." ( VroUk.) 



Finally, I may conclude this section with the words of 

 Thomson : — " We conclude by adopting and expressing the words 

 of Dr. Blundell, ' that it is contrary to reason, experience, and 

 anatomy to believe that the strong attention of the mother's mind 

 to a determinate object or eveut can cause a determinate or a 

 specific impression upon the body of her child without any force 

 or violence from without ; and that it is equally improbable that, 

 when the imagination is operating, the application of the 

 mother's hand to any part of her own body will cause a disfigu- 

 ration or specific impression on a corresponding part of the body 

 of the child.' " 



Prrt 2.~-:Efect of Maternal Nutrition. 



The contention may possibly be raised, as has been hinted in 

 earlier sections, that the state of the mother's nutrition during 

 the period of pregnancy may be a factor in the production of 

 abnormalities. The forms in which this kind of influence might 

 a priori be expected most probably to take effect are those of 

 dwarfs and giants, but as I endeavoured to show, when dealing 

 with those groups, there is no evidence of this factor being of 

 any imporrance ; indeed there seems, on the contrary, good reason 

 for the formation of an opposite opinion. The case of the lion- 

 cubs affected with cleft-palate is, however, one which at first 

 sight seems to lend some colour to such an hypothesis. In 

 considering it, however, it must not be forgotten that these 

 were not hereditary cases, but had, in all probability, a specific 

 cause, and ceased to occur when that cause was removed. On 

 the other hand, there are numbers of cases which might be cited 

 where faults of excess and of defect co-existed in the same 

 children, to explain both of which by the nutrition hypothesis 

 Avould seem to be a very difficult matter. Thus, for example, in 

 the Ileiuzler family polydactylism and defective development of 

 the teeth co-existed. And, again, and this case is of special 

 interest in connection with the lion-cub matter, Eoux * has 

 recorded an instance where a father and child were both the 



Lucas, op. cit. vol i. p. 307. 



