The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-11-14

I passed a terrible time till the dinner
hour that night. But dressing seemed
somehow to relieve me, as it often does
There's something very calming about
dressing for dinner. Tom and the girls
were out, so we had a square party-my
father and mother, myself and Pontifex
Outwardly, there was nothing different
from usual in the conversation. That
seemed safest to all of us. We discussed
the season, the political situation, the
last new book, the last play at the I,v-
ceum, as cheerfully as we could to look
well before the servants. But 1 could see
my father and mother were watching me
hard and Pontifex's cold eye was look
ing through and through me- After din
ner we men adjourned to the smoking
room. For awhile we sat there talking.
the conversation grew real; then my faith
er rose and slipped quietly from the par
ty. / was left tete-a-tete for some min
utes with PontifeX. Bit by bit the pro-
fessor drew me out unawares He talked
sweetly and sympathetically. l mustn't
mind these wild threats of my fathers
He himself had always believed in this
inherited memory, and was not in the least
surprised it should now and then assume
a peculiar form in a very exceptional and
nervously organized Individual In point
of fact, he had always expected to find
such alterations. He saw no reason to
doubt that a man, by taking thought
might recall the very acts and experiences
of his ancestors. Such memory was nor
NAL in the lower animals 1t might rank
In humanity as a mere lapsed faculty.
Then you think it might even 90 be-
yond the parents's lives?" 1 asked at last
quite grateful for his acquiescence.
ooh, certainly. Not a doubt of It. 1t
occurs in nature. Take the well-known
case of the queen bee for exampe She
transmits to her worker offspring the in
stincts of honey gathering, of comb-build-
ing, and of larva-nursing, which she her
self has never at all possessed, but which
she derives implicitly from some very early
undeveloped ancestress, before the race of
bees had taken to socialism. Every female
bee then still performed the whole work
OF ceIl-making and rearing the grubs Now
the queen inherits those dormant faculties
and passes them on to her weaker daugh-
tiers. That's an absolute analogue"
80 1t is l cried, quite charmed by his
reasoning. And there's no reason, there
fore, why man shouldn't in like man
ner recall the minutest events in the pre-
vious history of all his ancestors from the
earliest period"
None at an Pontifex answered, lean
ing forward and gazing at me. and lust
think what gain that would be to sci
ence! The thinker who devoted himself
to thus unravelling the secrets of PRINT
tive humanity would open up for us a most
marvellous and Illuminating page in ev-
dictionary history. He would recollect ey-
cry phase in the long series of stages by
which the monkey-like creature with hairy
hide and pointed ears grew gradually to
the image of the Apollo and the Venus"
That would be a splendid achieve
ment," l exclaimed enthusiastically
Just at that moment, as 1 afterwards
remembered, the door opened quietly; but
1 took no notice of it at the time, believ-
ing that it was only Roberts come to take
away the coffee cups. He moved about
the room with the noiseless tread of a
well-trained servant; then he stood at the
back of my chair for a second and short
" moved aside. 1 didn't look round. Twas
an unreasonable interruption.
well, tell me-" the professor went on
in rather a different voice. so you have
really succeeded, by successive effortsl of
memory, in recalling everything in your
father and mothers lives? That's inter-
esting, veryl"
"Oh, yes I answered. "In my moth
er's life, quite everything. In my faith
er's, as yet only the first salient incident;
but that very important one. I seem
to start always on my task of reconstruc-
ton with one fact as a clew-some seri-
Gus fact that made an indelible impress