250 NATURAL INHERITANCE. 



F,2. 





M, 3. 





FF, 4. 



FM, 5. 



MF, 6. 



MM, 7. 



FFF, 8. 



FMF, 10. 



MFF, 12. 



MMF, 14. 



FFM, 9. 



FMM, 11. 



MFM, 13. 



MMM, 15. 



It will be observed that the double of the number of any ancestor 

 is that of his or her Father ; and that the double of the number 

 plus 1 is that of his or her Mother ; thus FM 5 has for her father 

 FMF 10, and for her mother FMM 11. 



When the word Brother or Sister has to be abbreviated it is safer 

 not to be too stingy in assigning letters, but to write br, sr, and in 

 the plural brs, srs ; also for the long phrase of " brothers and sisters," 

 to write brss. 



All these symbols are brief enough to save a great deal of space, 

 and they are perfectly explicit. When such a phrase has to be 

 expressed as " the Fraternity of whom FF is one " I write in my 

 own notes simply FF', but there has been no occasion to adopt this 

 symbol in the present book. 



I have not satisfied myself as to any system for expressing 

 descendants. Theoretically, the above binary system admits of 

 extension by the use of negative indices, but the practical applica- 

 tion of the idea seems cumbrous. 



We and the French sadly want a word that the Germans possess 

 to stand for Brothers and Sisters. Fraternity refers properly to the 

 brothers only, but its use has been legitimately extended here to 

 mean the brothers and the sisters, after the qualities of the latter 

 have been reduced to their male equivalents. The Greek word 

 adelphic would do for an adjective. 



Pedigrees. — The method employed in the Record of Family Faculties 

 for entering all the facts concerning each kinsman in a methodical 

 manner was fully described in that book, and could not easily be 

 epitomised here ; but a description of the method in which the 

 manuscript extracts from the records have been made for my own 

 use will be of service to others when epitomising their own family 

 characteristics. It will be sufficient to describe the quarto books 

 that contain the medical extracts. Each page is ten and a half inches 

 high and eight and a half wide, and the two pages, 252, 253, that are 



