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THE AMERICAN NATURALIST [Vol. XLVI1 



duced litters of living young. These litters contained 

 in all 54 individuals. Twenty-one, or almost 40 per cent., 

 of these young guinea-pigs died within a few days or less 

 than four weeks after birth, while 33 of them survived. 

 Thus, out of 69 full term young, of which 54 were born 

 alive, only 33 have survived, and many of these are small 

 and excitable animals, and although not treated them- 

 selves have since given rise to defective offspring in sev- 



eral cases where they have been mated with one another. 

 On the other hand, 35 control matings have produced 32 

 living litters consisting of 60 individuals, only 4 of which 

 have died and 56 are perfectly normal animals. 



It is of interest that the young animals before dying 

 show various nervous disturbances, having epileptic-like 

 seizures, and in most cases die in a state of convulsion. 



The important fact in the above case is that the father 

 only was alcoholic, the mother being a normally vigorous 

 animal. This experiment clearly demonstrates that the 

 paternal germ cells may be modified by chemical treat- 

 ment to such a degree that the treated nude will beget 

 abnormal offspring even though he be mated with a 

 vigorous female. A reconsideration of the figures in the 

 first line of the table shows really how decidedly the 

 injured spermatozoon expresses itself in the fate of the 

 egg with which it combines. 



For comparison the second line of the table shows the 

 results of matings between alcoholized females and nor- 

 mal males. These matings might be expected to give 

 more marked results than the previous ones, since in the 

 treated female not only the germ cells may be affected, 

 but the developing embryo itself may be injured by the 

 presence of alcohol in the blood of the mother. 



There are 15 matings between alcoholized females and 

 normal males. Three of these, or 20 per cent., gave nega- 

 tive results, or were possibly aborted very early. Three 

 stillborn litters were produced consisting of nine indi- 

 viduals, while 60 per cent, of the matings gave living 

 litters. This result is better by 16 per cent, than that 



