504 
Chandler—The Inter-Generation Period . 
it is evidnet that the first and the last of the ten generations 
are sadly incomplete; and, if these be omitted, the mean period 
rises to 32.1. 
In the preparation of this paper considerable search has been 
made for lines extending through a larger number of generations 
than any that are here shown, but it has had very indifferent 
success. Such lines of descent, when claimed for families of the 
commonalty, usually present doubtful points of connection, and 
rest .under suspicion of being due to more or less of ingenious 
fabrication; and, while royal and noble lines are to be found, 
such lines of course are generally along the older branches of 
the family, and so give a period much shorter than the true 
one, although the tendency in such lines to follow descent through 
sons counteracts this in part. The line from William the Con¬ 
queror to Queen Victoria offers an illustration. It covers 
twenty-five or twenty-seven periods, according to the ancestral 
line which is followed, and gives a mean period of 31.7 or 29.3 
years. 
Perhaps a fair summary of the results of the work presented 
in this paper may be thus stated. The more nearly complete 
the record of births in each generation and the greater the num¬ 
ber of generations included in the examination, apparently the 
greater is the tendency to a mean period of one-third of a cen¬ 
tury. 
Ripon , Wis ., December , 1898 , 
