336 NATURE AND LIFE. 
alienation represents a quarter of all those who are thus 
diseased. Moreau (of Tours) and others state that the 
proportion is even greater. Heredity in madness does not 
merely comprise direct transmission of insanity properly so 
called; hysteria, epilepsy, chorea, idiocy, hypochondria, may 
proceed from madness, and it may in turn reproduce them, 
In their passage from one generation to another, these 
various diseases of the nerves become in a manner mutually 
transformed.’ Herpin, the Genevese, noted, among the an- 
cestors of two hundred and forty-three epileptic subjects, 
seven epileptics, twenty-one insane, and twenty-four per- 
sons affected with cerebro-spinal diseases. Georget draws 
the conclusion, from numerous observations made at la 
Salpétriére, that hysterical women almost always had 
among their near relatives those who were hysterie, 
epileptic, hypochondriac, or insane. Moreau dwells on 
the very frequent occurrence of morbid nervous conditions 
among the ancestors of the idiotic and imbecile. A single 
fact will suffice to convey some conception of the various 
and strange complications following on the transmission by 
descent of nervous disorders. Dr. Morel attended four 
brothers of the same family. The grandfather of these 
children died insane; their father was quite incapable of 
fixing his mind on any thing; their uncle, a distinguished 
physician, marked by high intellectual power, was noted 
for his eccentricities. Now, these four children, sprung 
from the same stock, exhibited very differing forms of psy- 
chical disorders: one was a madman, subject to periodi- 
1 Mere alcoholic intoxication may be transformed into serious nervous 
diseases. Children conceived in an acute attack of drunkenness are 
often epileptic, insane, idiotic, etc. These facts have been remarked since 
very ancient days. A law of Carthage forbade any other beverage but 
water on the day of marital cohabitation, and Amyot says, ‘‘ Drunkenness 
begets nothing of any worth.” Late and accurate researches prove that 
a child begotten even in a mere passing fit of intoxication always bears 
ineffaceable marks of more or less grave degeneracy. 
