Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1894-01-19
THE PROFESSIONAL CLUB,
"Heredity" as Discussed i'm DIR.
ThOmpSOn's Paper.

The December meeting of the PROBES
sional club, held at the Brooks Hous,
Monday evening, was marked by an un
usually large attendance of members ant
guests. The paper, by DR.. w. N. Thomp
son of the Brattleboro Retreat, was a re
markably strong and carefully compactet
statement of the facts and theories, upor
this interesting subject of investigation
which science has established or suggested
1t was a paper which admits of no salts
factory abstract and our purpose is only
to touch upon some of its more salient
points.
DR.. Thompson said in beginning: "ThC
| general truth that organisms of a given
| type descend from organisms of the same
type has been so well established as to be
automatic. The trite aphorism of Lin.
naeus, Like begets like is written on
the universal face of nature. From the
simplest form of protoplasm, which repro.
duces itself by division, to the highest diff.
ferentation in the human organism, there
is no exception to this rule. A creature
that did not resemble its parents would be
a monstrosity. The matter of transmission
of hereditary tendency, physical and men,
! tai, characteristic of the parents, is bio
logical problem that has not as yet received
a satisfactory solution
The theories which have been advanced
from the earliest time to the present, es-
pecially those of Darwin, Prof. Weismann,
and of the O-Lamarckan school, were
outlined. A fact especially to be noted is
that while certain nervous tendencies or
habits, or injuries strongly affecting the
nervous system, are transmitted, mutila-
tions of various organs are not. For il.
lustration, the Chinese habit of compress
ing the feet and the Indian habit of COM
pressing the head produce no effect upon
the posterity of these races. Weismann
cut off the tails of mice through thou
sand generations without influencing the
growth of that appendage. The conclu-
sion is that acquired variations to be trans
mitted must be in the line of utility.
Among domestic animals useful vara-
tions are brought about by the artificial Sc
lection of the breeder, which accomplishes
in a few generations the same end that
would be attained by natural selection only
after almost countless generations. Lord
Somerville, speaking of the work of breed
ers in this respect, says: at would seem
that they had chalked upon the wall a
form perfect in itself, and then given it eX-
istence." In the same line history records
that Frederick William l., the father of
Frederick the Great, who was noted for
his love of colossal statures, would not al
low his guards to marry women of stature
inferior to their own, and the result was a
generation of men and women of impos-
ing size. 1t is to be noted, in passing,
that any relaxation of vigilance on the
part of the breeder is followed by ten
dency of the animal to return to its nor
NAL form.
bo ;e
patble with the laws of heredity, but
rather confirmation of them, for the
reason that every animal is the composite
representative, not only of its immediate
progenitors, but of many lines of ancestors.
Even in the fifth generation the number is
81, and if we include but five more it
reaches round thousand.
Only among the invertebrata and the
sub-speCies of vertebrate, where the envi-
ronment is uniformly the same and instinct
the only known form of mental activity,
does like really beget like, and the species
and genus remain constant. When We APP
proach the higher forms of vertebrate,
where crossing is carried on in all degrees
of varying dissimiarity, the species alone
is found to be constant, while its traits and
characteristics present almost limtless va
ration. Heredity is not, then, a simple
law, but instead a mass of complex phe-
nomena, dependent in turn on certain laws
of generation upon which the whole SUI
perstructure of heredity is founded.
The tendency of inbreeding to intensity
individual characteristics is well known,
but among breeders it is a recognized fact
that if carried too far it leads to inevitable
deterioration. In the human race the
same rule holds true. 1t cannot be main
tanned that the evil effects of marriages of
persons near of kin is great if occurring
only here and there, and it cannot be de-
MED that a somewhat larger per cent of
diseases consequent upon degeneration APP
pear in their families. The more dissimi-
lar the parents or the ancestry the less will
be the evil effects. The offspring of colo
MES of criminals steadily deteriorate, not
only mentally and morally, but physically,
until sterility results and the race or fami-
ly becomes extinct.
Interesting examples were quoted of the
results produced by crosses of different
breeds of animals and different races of
men. Darwin experimental by crossing
pure breeds of fowl, in which there was
not trace of red, which was the original
coloring, with the result that in several of
the mongrels red appeared. Children of
tentot have always the good nature and
the gentle disposition of the father, but
the children of white men and Hottentot
women have in them all the germs of I'M
ruly passion and vice. When the negro is
crossed with the Hottentot the product is a
mild, industrious person. An instance of
reversion to the primitive type is recorded
by Livingstone, who says that the children
of Portuguese and negroes are so notorious
ly bad that an inhabitant once said to him.
"God made the white man and God made
the black man, but the devil made the
half-caste.n
The various phenomena of heredity are
conveniently grouped under the three heads
of direct heredity, reversional heredity,
and indirect heredity. Under the second
classification many illustrations were noted.
Plutarch relates the case of a Greek wom-
an who gave birth to negro child. When
brought to trial it transpired that she was
descended in the fourth degree from a ne
gro. Darwin quotes the remarkable case
of pointer which gave birth to seven
puppies, four of which were marked with
blue and white, color so unusual among
pointers that the mother was thought to
have played false with one of the grey
hounds, and the whole litter was killed ex-