Chap. XII. 



INHERITANCE. 



23 



definite conclusion. In spme cases mutilations have been prac- 

 tised for a vast number of generations without any inherited result. 

 Godron has remarked 60 that different races of man have from 

 time immemorial knocked out their upper incisors, cut off joints 

 of their fingers, made holes of immense size through the lobes of 

 their ears or through their nostrils, made deep gashes in various 

 parts of their bodies, and there is no reason whatever to suppose 

 that these mutilations have ever been inherited. Adhesions 

 due to inflammation and pits from the small-pox (and formerly 

 many consecutive generations must have been thus pitted) 

 are not inherited. With respect to Jews, I have been assured 

 by three medical men of the Jewish faith that circumcision, 

 which has been practised for so many ages, has produced no 

 inherited effect ; Blumenbach, on the other hand, asserts 61 that 

 in Germany Jews are often born in a condition rendering cir- 

 cumcision difficult, so that a name is there applied to them 

 signifying " born circumcised." The oak and other trees must 

 have borne galls from primeval times, yet they do not pro- 

 duce inherited excrescences; many other such facts could be 

 adduced. 



On the other hand, various cases have been recorded of cats, 

 dogs, and horses, which have had their tails, legs, &c, amputated 

 or injured, producing offspring with the same parts ill-formed ; 

 but as it is not at all rare for similar malformations to appear 

 spontaneously, all such cases may be due to mere coincidence. 

 Nevertheless, Dr. Prosper Lucas has given, on good authorities, 

 such a long list of inherited injuries, that it is difficult not to 

 believe in them. Thus, a cow that had lost a horn from an 

 accident with consequent suppuration, produced three calves 

 which were hornless on the same side of the head. With the 

 horse, there seems hardly a doubt that bony exostoses on the 

 legs, caused by too much travelling on hard roads, are inherited. 

 Blumenbach records the case of a man who had his little finger 

 on the right hand almost cut off, and which in consequence 

 grew crooked, and his sons had the same finger on the same 

 hand similarly crooked. A soldier, fifteen years before his 

 marriage, lost his left eye from purulent ophthalmia, and his 



60 ' De l'Espece,' torn, ii., 1859, p. 299. 



61 ' Philosoph. Magazine,' vol. iv., 1799, p. ,5. 



