THE STUDY OF AMERICAN FAMILIES 241 



teristics of the generations yet unborn, and would, indeed, 

 aid in bringing about better matings. It is to be hoped 

 that the time will come when each person will regard it as 

 a patriotic duty to cooperate in the compilation of such 

 genealogical records even to the statement of facts which 

 are, according to the (often false) conventions of the day, 

 not considered ''creditable." 



2. Family Traits 



The results of such genealogical studies will be striking. 

 Each ''family" will be seen to be stamped with a peculiar 

 set of traits depending upon the nature of its germ plasm. 

 One family will be characterized by political activity, an- 

 other by scholarship, another by financial success, another 

 by professional success, another by insanity in some members 

 with or without brilliancy in others, another by imbecility 

 and epilepsy, another by larceny and sexual immorality, 

 another by suicide, another by mechanical ability, or vocal 

 talent, or ability in literary expression. In some families 

 the members are prevailingly slender, in others stout; in 

 some tall, others short; some blue-eyed, others dark-eyed; 

 some with flaxen hair, others with black hair; some have 

 diseases of the ear, others of the eye, or throat or circulation. 

 In some nearly all die of consumption; in others there is no 

 weakness of the mucous membranes but a tendency to 

 apoplexy; others die prevailingly of Bright's disease or valv- 

 ular disease of the heart, or of pneumonia. In some families 

 nearly all die at over 80, in others all die under 40 years 

 of age. Stammering, hirsuteness, extra dentition, aquiline 

 nose, lobeless-ears, crooked digits, extra digits, short digits, 

 broad thumbs, ridged nails, — there is hardly an organ or the 

 smallest part of an organ that has not its peculiar condition 

 that stamps a family. 



Said a lady to me, "I was traveling in Egypt and met a 



