Morning journal and courier., 1890-05-06
uEnEDITY IN HANDWRITING.

Peculf0flt1es of Family Handwriting
 May Be Transmitted From Father to
 Son.
 The question has occasionally been asked Does handwriting ever exhibit hereditary characteristicsa This is also an interesting branch of the subject, and although Q great deal might be said pro and con, the question may, generally speaking, be answered in the affirmative. Indeed, there is to be found in the subject of the heredity of handwriting significance of ascertained fact in favor of the general prevalence of such law trans- mitting it's effects from one generation to another, says writer in Cassells Family magazine, which is well worthy of the con- sideration of physiologists. Nothing, how ever, can be more certain than that, in the matter of handwriting, family resemblances are as common to almost every representa-. tive as, for instance, the family nose, the family gait or habit of speech, or other pee culiarity by which one particular family is distinguished from another.
 It may, of course, be said that large pro- portion of this supposed varissmblance in family handwriting is attributable as much to obvious facilities for imitation, thus pro- pre-disposing natural cause subject to the operation of the law of heredity. With such facilities @ sons handwriting-let 1t be supposed-may happen to resemble In some respects that of his father, or a daughter's that of her mother or of an aunt. or other female relative, or one brothers that of an- other brother, and so on, the styles of char actsristics of family handwriting being vari- ously duplicated or reproduced. Still, while that is the case in many instances, there will doubtless be numerous exceptions to this pretty general rule. For, as in hu- man physiology, 1t is a we'll accredited fact that no two faces are alike in every feature, vuIAt< Id A- t%A found precisely to resemble each other in all points, however nearly they may seem to do so. Sometimes, indeed, tho difference is 80 grsat-just as in the human face or flea. tures-that it is quite impoesibls to detect any link of the relationship existing.
 Furthermore, the psculisrities of family handwriting may, like other more common hereditary symptoms and dispositions, en- tirely pass over a generation. and then once more reappear, bearing evidence, in not @ l few points of similarity, of their kin to the | original copy. This fact, however, applies ! more especially to families with whom the
 use of the quill or pen has ever been one of its strong points. It can obviously have no | reference to persons whose opportunities in
 the practice of handwriting have been few
 and inconsiderable. But why 1t should be | possible for this trait of chirography some times to skip one or two generations, and then again unmistakably to reassert itself, is perhaps only another and-te may be reck- | oned-a trivial example of that cratic course
 which nature oftentimes pursues, bafaing all
 human comprehension. A clew to this sin. gular fact of transmitted chirogrsphic like
 ness skipping one or more generations, and
 then reappearing, may, of course, be found not so much in the moral as in the physical disposition inherited. And so the heredity
 of handwriting may be, perhaps. best ex
 plained according to that invariable process
 of nature by which man inherits some
 thing of the fragments as well as the linea
 ments of his progenitor-something of thu
 manipulative power and grasp of the fingers
 as well as of the form and expression of thu
 face.