Hereditary traits.

Date:
1878
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hereditary traits. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    12/22 (page 422)
    case of the Playford family, to which the present amateur champion sculler belongs. In cricket, the Walker family and the Grace family may be cited among amateurs, the Humphreys among professional players. Grace in dancing was transmitted for three generations in the Yestris family. It must, however, be noted that in some of these cases we may fairly consider that example and teaching have had much to do with the result. Take rowing for instance. A good oarsman will impart his style to a whole crew if he rows stroke for them; and even if he only trains them (as Morrison, for instance, trained the Cambridge crew a few years ago), he will make good oarsmen of men suitably framed and possessing ordinary aptitude for rowing. We remember well how a famous stroke-oar at Cambridge imparted to one at least of the Univer- sity crew (a fellow-collegian of his, and therefore rowing with him con- stantly also in his College boat) so exact an imitation of his style that one rather dusky evening, when the latter was “ stroking ” a scratch four past a throng of University men, a dispute arose as to which of the two was really stroke of the four. Anyone who knows how characteristic commonly is the rowing of any first-class stroke, and still more anyone who chances to know how peculiar was the style of the University “ stroke-oar ” referred to, will understand how closely his style must have been adopted, when experienced oarsmen, not many yards from the passing four, were unable to decide at once which of the two men were rowing,—even though the evening was dusky enough to prevent the fea- tures of the stroke (whose face was not fully in view at the moment) from being discerned. Seeing that a first-rate oarsman can thus commu- nicate his style so perfectly to another, it cannot be regarded as demon- strably a case of hereditary transmission if the Claspers rowed in the same style as their father, or if the present champion sculler (making allowances for the change introduced by the sliding seat) rows very much like his father and his uncle. Some peculiarities, such as stammering, lisping, babbling, and the like, are not easily referable to any special class of hereditary traits, be- cause it is not clear how far they are to l>c regarded as depending on bodily or how far on mental peculiarities. It might seem obvious that stammering was in most cases uncontrollable by the will, and babbling might seem as certainly controllable. Yet there are cases which throw doubt on either conclusion. Thus, Dr. Lucas tells us of a servant-maid whose loquacity was apparently quite uncontrollable. She would talk to people till they were ready to faint; and if there were no human being to listen to her, she would talk to animals and inanimate objects, or would talk aloud to herself. She had to be discharged. “ But,” she said to her master, “ I am not to* blame ; it all comes from my father. He had the same fault, and it drove my mother to distraction ; and his father was just the same.” Stammering has been transmitted through as many as five generations. The same has been noticed of peculiarities of vision. The Montmorency look, a sort of half squint, affected nearly