232 
Miscellanea 
mis-translation. The beautiful " alhina " was not the mother of Family No. 6, but the friend 
of the mother. The text read.s : — 
"II Cav. N. N. senti grande simpatia per una albina di belle forme e desidero avere 
una liglia che le rassomigliasse. Con tale scopo indusse la moglie a farlese amica, e gik 
auibedue vagheggiarono la metlesima idea. II desiderio fu soddisfatto colla nascita di una 
bella bambina ; ma moriva a due anni, &c." 
The words "indusse amica" mean that he induced la moglie, his wife to make friends 
with the '■Udhina'" ; literally, far, to make, le, her [the alhina\ amica, a friend, si, to herself. 
Arcoleo evidently attributes the albino births to " sympathy," or other mysterious influence, in 
which case he might well call the occurrence a " fatto curiosissimo." Nevertheless his memoir is 
perfectly consistent, save for a numerical slip in one place, and when he wrote that he knew no 
instance of hereditary albinism he meant no more or less than he said, doubtful as this has 
seemed to Professor Pearson. 
W. BATESON. 
Cambridge, 27 Feb. 1905. 
[I am sorry that I overhastily read Arcoleo's paragraph and thus stated that Cav. N. N. made 
an arnica of the " fair albino." It is clear that he caused his wife to make a friend of her with 
the object that his wife and not the albino lady should provide the albinotic daughter. Arcoleo's 
consistency is thus established, and I can only hope that his powers of scientific observation are 
not detrimentally influenced by the capacity thus exhibited for archaic belief. K.P.] 
