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Title: Degeneracy - Its Causes, Signs and Results
Author: Talbot, Eugene S.
Language: English
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XXXV. DEGENERACY: ITS CAUSES, SIGNS, AND RESULTS. By Professor EUGENE S.
TALBOT, M.D., Chicago. With Illustrations. 6s.
_THE CONTEMPORARY SCIENCE SERIES_
EDITED BY HAVELOCK ELLIS
DEGENERACY
[Illustration: DWARFISM AND GIANTISM.]
DEGENERACY
_ITS CAUSES, SIGNS, AND RESULTS_
BY EUGENE S. TALBOT, M.D., D.D.S.,
FELLOW OF THE CHICAGO ACADEMY OF MEDICINE; MEMBER OF
THE CHICAGO ACADEMY OF SCIENCES; HONORARY MEMBER OF
THE BERLIN ODONTOLOGISCHEN GESELLSCHAFT, AND THE
ASSOCIATION GÉNÉRALE DES DENTISTES DE FRANCE;
PROFESSOR OF DENTAL AND ORAL SURGERY, WOMAN'S
MEDICAL SCHOOL, NORTH-WESTERN UNIVERSITY, U.S.A.
WITH 120 ILLUSTRATIONS
LONDON
WALTER SCOTT, LTD., PATERNOSTER SQUARE
1898
PREFACE
The present work is the result of more than twenty years' labour in a
limited medical department of biology. It demonstrates once more the truth
of the scientific principle, that the truth or falsity of any theory or
working hypothesis becomes more and more demonstrable the further its
application is attempted in the explanation of new lines of facts. The
truth of the degeneracy doctrine had forced itself on the writer long
before its popular apotheosis under Lombroso and Nordau, because it alone
sufficed for an explanation of constitutional and local defects
(encountered in a seemingly limited speciality of medicine), which local
causes failed entirely to explain. The investigations thereon resultant
have appeared in medical and dental journals for the past two decades. The
present work is chiefly based on these researches. At the same time, the
author has drawn largely from all fields of biology cultivated by European
investigators, while he must acknowledge a particular indebtedness to the
investigations (of which he has made large use beside that elsewhere
specifically acknowledged) of certain American investigators--Rush,
Parkmen, Ray, G. Frank Lydston, C. L. Dana, C. F. Folsom, W. W. Godding,
E. C. Spitzka, E. D. Cope, D. R. Brower, Marsh, B. Sachs, Harriet C. B.
Alexander, Clara Barrus, H. M. Bannister, Delia E. Howe, Grace Peckham,
Adolph Meyer, Kerlin, Wiley, J. G. Kiernan, W. E. Allison, Osborn, R.
Dewey, Frederick Peterson, Gihon, Cowles, W. A. Hammond, A. B. Holder, C.
H. Hughes, F. W. Starr, F. C. Hoyt, J. H. McBride, C. K. Mills, C. B.
Burr, T. D. Crothers, W. S. Christopher, W. X. Sudduth, A. Lagorio, J.
Workman, Wilmarth, and others. These scientists had raised an exceedingly
stable foundation for the doctrine of degeneracy long before Lombroso and
Nordau (forcing one phase of the subject into popular recognition)
compelled an examination of the entire doctrine.
The work has been written with a special intention of reaching educators
and parents. With this object, it has avoided laying stress on any one
cause of degeneracy, and ignoring factors which produce it and are
aggravated by it. The doctrinaire reformer will here find no support for
any limited theory. While it does not pretend in the slightest degree to
give all the details of degeneracy, it attempts to lay down general
principles for practical purposes in a way that permits their application
to the solution of sociologic problems.
From a sense of scientific accuracy no attempts have been made to
demarcate, rigidly, abnormality from disease, or atavism from arrested
development, except as may be done by the features of the cases in which
the terms are used. The guiding principle adopted has been that the
factors of degeneracy affect in the ancestor the checks on excessive
action acquired during the evolution of the race, thus producing a state
of nervous exhaustion. The descendant in consequence is unable to reach
the state of the ancestor thus nervously exhausted.
For the illustrations, other than those that are original, the author is
indebted to the _Journal of the American Medical Association_, _Dental
Cosmos_, _The International Dental Journal_, _The St. Louis Clinical
Record_, to M. Félix Alcan, and to the officers of the New York State
Reformatory and Illinois State Reformatory, Drs. Geo. T. Carpenter, W. A.
Pusey, F. S. Coolidge, Ch. Féré, Zuckerkandl, John E. Greves, Amsterdam;
Ernst Sjoberg, Stockholm; Bastian, J. G. Kiernan, E. C. Spitzka, John
Ridlon, James W. Walker, and Ignatius Donnelly.
E. S. T.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. INTRODUCTION 1
II. THE STIGMATA OF DEGENERACY 27
III. HEREDITY AND ATAVISM 40
IV. CONSANGUINEOUS AND NEUROTIC INTERMARRIAGES 79
V. INTERMIXTURE OF RACES 92
VI. TOXIC AGENTS 104
VII. CONTAGIOUS AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES 121
VIII. CLIMATE, SOIL, AND FOOD 130
IX. SCHOOL STRAIN 150
X. THE DEGENERATE CRANIUM 161
XI. THE DEGENERATE FACE AND NOSE 177
XII. DEGENERACY OF THE LIP PALATE, EYE, AND EAR 196
XIII. THE DEGENERATE TEETH AND JAWS 219
XIV. DEGENERACY OF THE BODY 258
XV. DEGENERACY IN REVERSIONAL TENDENCIES 282
XVI. DEGENERACY OF THE BRAIN 294
XVII. DEGENERACY OF MENTALITY AND MORALITY 315
XVIII. CONCLUSIONS 346
INDEX OF AUTHORS 363
INDEX OF SUBJECTS 367
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
FIG. PAGE
DWARFISM AND GIANTISM (_Journal of American Medical
Association_) _Frontispiece_
1. ANTE-CHRISTIAN IRISH PIPES (Donnelly, _Atlantis_) 111
2. ANTE-COLUMBIAN PIPES FROM SCULPTURE AT STRATFORD-ON-AVON
(Donnelly, _Atlantis_) 112
3-6. CHANGES IN SKULL TYPES (_Original_) 134
7. WANT OF UNION IN FRONTAL SUTURE (Dr. Greves, Amsterdam) 163
8. STIGMATA OF DEGENERATE CRANIUM (Original) 165
9. HYDROCEPHALY (Dr. Ernst Sjöberg, Stockholm) 166
10. KEPHALONES (Dr. Ernst Sjöberg, Stockholm) 167
11. MICROCEPHALY (Dr. Ernst Sjöberg, Stockholm) 168
12. DOLICHOCEPHALY (Barnard Davis) 169
13. SPHENOCEPHALY (New York State Reformatory) 170
14. BRACHYCEPHALY (Barnard Davis) 171
15. PLATYCEPHALY (Barnard Davis) 172
16. PLAGIOCEPHALY (Barnard Davis) 173
17. SCAPHOCEPHALY (Barnard Davis) 174
18. LARGE ORBITS (Dr. Greves, Amsterdam) 180
19. CAMPER'S ANGLE (Original) 181
20. JOHANNA, FEMALE CHIMPANZEE (Original) 182
21. NEGRO CRIMINAL YOUTH (Illinois State Reformatory) 182
22. CAUCASIAN FACE (Original) 183
23. DEGENERATE FACE AND ARREST OF UPPER JAW (Original) 184
24. DEGENERATE FACE AND NOSE (_Dental Cosmos_) 185
25. DEGENERATE FACE AND ARREST OF LOWER JAW (Original) 187
26. ASYMMETRICAL FACE (New York State Reformatory) 188
27. DEFLECTION OF NASAL SEPTUM (Dr. Greves, Amsterdam) 190
28. HYPERTROPHY OF TURBINATES (Dr. Greves, Amsterdam) 191
29. IRREGULAR DEVELOPMENT OF THE BONES OF THE NOSE
(Dr. Greves, Amsterdam) 192
30. OBLITERATED ANTRUM (Dr. Greves, Amsterdam) 193
31. CLEFT PALATE (Dr. G. T. Carpenter, Chicago) 198
32. HARE-LIP (Dr. G. T. Carpenter, Chicago) 201
33. CYCLOPIC EYE (Dr. J. G. Kiernan, Chicago) 204
34. CYCLOPIC MONSTER WITH SINGLE EYE (Dr. J. G. Kiernan,
Chicago) 205
35. FOETUS WITHOUT CHIN AND EARS AT EXTERNAL OPENING OF
FIRST GILL CLEFT (Bland Sutton, London) 207
36. EAR EMBRYOLOGY (Minot, Boston) 209
37. ARREST OF EAR DEVELOPMENT (_Journal of American
Medical Association_) 210
38. NORMAL EAR (Ibid.) 211
39. MOREL EAR (Ibid.) 213
40-45. DARWINIAN EARS AND ABNORMAL EARS (Ibid.) 215
46, 47. UNDEVELOPED EARS (Ibid.) 216
48, 49. ELEPHANTINE EARS (Ibid.) 217
Plates A and B. EVOLUTION OF THE TEETH (Osborn,
_International Dental Journal_) 223
50, 51. CALCIFICATION OF THE TEETH (Dr. C. N. Pierce,
Philadelphia) 226-7
52-56. SUPERNUMERARY TEETH (Original) 230-1
57-60. SUPERNUMERARY AND CONE-SHAPED TEETH (_Dental
Cosmos_) 232-3
61. CONE-SHAPED TEETH (Smale & Colyer, London) 234
62. MISSING THIRD MOLARS (Original) 235
63. MISSING THIRD MOLARS (Original) 236
64-66. MISSING LATERAL INCISORS (Original) 236-7
67. SO-CALLED HUTCHINSON'S TEETH (_American System of
Dentistry_) 238
68. DEGENERATE V-SHAPED JAW (Original) 239
69. HUTCHINSON'S TEETH (_Dental Cosmos_) 240
70, 71. CONE-SHAPED MOLARS (Ibid.) 240
72, 73. CONE-SHAPED MOLARS (Ibid.) 241
74. MIGRATING TEETH (Original) 241
75. CONE-SHAPED TEETH (Smale & Colyer, London) 242
76-78. RUDIMENTARY CUSPS (Original) 242-3
79. EXCESSIVELY DEVELOPED CUSPS (Smale & Colyer, London) 244
80-89. TEETH JOINED TOGETHER (_Dental Cosmos_) 246-7
90. V-SHAPED ARCH (Original) 249
91. SADDLE-SHAPED ARCH (Original) 251
92. HYPERTROPHY OF THE ALVEOLAR PROCESS (Original) 253
93. HYPERTROPHY OF THE ALVEOLAR PROCESS (Original) 254
94. ARREST OF THE FACE (New York State Reformatory) 255
95. ARREST OF THE FACE AND LOWER JAW (New York State
Reformatory) 256
96. SPINA BIFIDA (Dr. W. A. Pusey, Chicago) 259
97. ARRESTED CHEST (Dr. J. Ridlon, Chicago) 261
98. ECTRODACTYLIA (Dr. J. Ridlon, Chicago) 264
99. MARCRODACTYLIA (Dr. J. Ridlon, Chicago) 265
100. CLUB-FEET (Dr. J. Ridlon, Chicago) 267
101. ARREST OF FACE (Original) 270
102. FEMINISM (Dr. Féré, Paris) 273
103. FEMINISM (Dr. Féré, Paris) 275
104. ACROMEGALY (Original) 277
105. ACROMEGALY (_Journal of American Medical Association_) 279
106. DEGENERATE FEET (New York State Reformatory) 280
107. PREMATURE SENESCENCE (Original) 288
108. EXCESSIVE DEVELOPED APPENDIX (Original) 290
109. NORMALLY DEVELOPED APPENDIX (Original) 291
110. ARRESTED APPENDIX (Original) 292
111. BRAIN FROM PARANOIAC CRIMINAL (Dr. J. G. Kiernan,
Chicago) 295
112. BRAIN OF GAUSS (Vogt, _Lectures on Man_) 296
113. FOETAL BRAIN (Bastian) 297
114. IDIOT BRAIN (Dr. J. G. Kiernan, Chicago) 297
115. IMBECILE BRAIN (Spitzka, _Insanity_) 298
116. SPECIALISED FUNCTION IN THE CORTEX CEREBRI (Dana) 308
117. CELLS OF THE BRAIN (Spitzka, _Insanity_) 310
DEGENERACY
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTION
Considered as a condition hurtful to the type, the conception of
degeneracy may be said to appear even in the precursors of man, since
animals destroy soon after birth offspring which, to them, appear
peculiar. With that stage of development of the religious sense marked by
assigning malign occult powers to natural objects and forces, this view of
degeneracy became systematised, and exposed weakly or deformed offspring,
charged to evil powers, to death. This occult conception of degeneracy is
even yet a part of American folklore. Against degenerate children charms
are still used by the "witch-doctors" among the "Pennsylvania Dutch."
These people are on the level of culture of the early seventeenth century
middle class English, if not a little below it. The folklore of these, as
embodied in Shakespeare, demonstrates, according to J. G. Kiernan,[1] that
ere the seventeenth century the fact that "mental and moral defect
expressed itself in physical stigmata was recognised and even the term
used." Thistleton Dyer[2] remarks that it is an old prejudice, not yet
extinct, that those who are defective or deformed are marked by nature as
prone to mischief. Thus in _King Richard III._ (i. 3) Margaret calls
Richard--
"Thou elvish-marked, abortive, rooting hog!
Thou that wast sealed in thy nativity
The slave of nature and the son of hell!"
She calls him hog in allusion to his cognisance, which was a boar. A
popular expression in Shakespeare's day for a deformed person was
"stigmatic." It denoted any one who had been stigmatised or burnt with
iron (an ignominious punishment), and hence was employed to represent a
person on whom nature had set a mark of deformity. Thus in the Third Part
of _Henry VI._ (ii. 2) Queen Margaret says--
"But thou art neither like thy sire nor dam;
But like a foul misshapen stigmatic,
Marked by the destinies to be avoided,
As venom toads, or lizards' dreadful stings."
Again in the Second Part of _Henry VI._ (v. 1) young Clifford says to
Richard--
"Foul stigmatic, that's more than thou canst tell."
In _A Midsummer Night's Dream_ (v. 1) Oberon wards off degeneracy from the
issue of the happy lovers by the following charm--
"And the blots of Nature's hand
Shall not in their issue stand;
Never mole, hare-lip nor scar,
Nor mark prodigious, such as are
Despised in nativity,
Shall upon their children be."
Constant allusions to this subject occur in old writers, showing how
strong was the belief of the early English on this point. King John (iv.
2) calls Hubert, the supposed murderer of Prince Arthur,--
"A fellow by the hand of Nature marked,
Quoted and signed to do a deed of shame."
Concerning this adaptation of the mind to the deformity of the body
Francis Bacon remarks: "Deformed persons are commonly even with Nature,
for as Nature hath done ill by them so do they by Nature, being void of
natural affection, and so they have their revenge on Nature."
The quaint old "Anatomist of Melancholy,"[3] Burton, seems but to
paraphrase modern curers of degeneracy when, at the end of his chapter on
the inheritance of defects, he remarks concerning this fetichistic notion:
"So many several ways are we plagued and published for our father's
defaults; in so much that as Fernelius truly saith: 'It is the greatest
part of our felicity to be well born, and it were happy for human kind, if
only such parents as are sound of body and mind should be suffered to
marry.' An husbandman will sow none but the best and choicest seed upon
his land, he will not rear a bull or an horse, except he be right shapen
in all parts, or permit him to cover a mare, except he be well assured of
his breed; we make choice of the best rams for our sheep, rear the neatest
kine, and keep the best dogs, _quanto id diligentius in procreandis
liberis observandum_! And how careful, then, should we be in begetting of
our children! In former times some countries have been so chary in this
behalf, so stern, that if a child were crooked or deformed in body or
mind, they made him away; so did the Indians of old by the relation of
Curtius, and many other well-governed commonwealths according to the
discipline of those times. 'Heretofore in Scotland,' saith Hect Boethius,
'if any were visited with the falling sickness, madness, gout, leprosy, or
any such dangerous disease which was likely to be propagated from the
father to the son, he was instantly gelded; a woman kept from all company
of men; and if by chance having some such disease she were found to be
with child, she with her brood were buried alive'; and this was done for
the common good, lest the whole nation should be injured or corrupted. A
severe doom, you will say, and not to be used amongst Christians, yet more
to be looked into than it is. For now by our too much facility in this
kind, in giving way for all to marry that will, too much liberty and
indulgence in tolerating all sorts, there is a vast confusion of
hereditary diseases, no family secure, no man almost free, from some
grievous infirmity or other, when no choice is had, but still the eldest
must marry, as so many stallions of the race; or if rich, be they fools or
dizzards, lame or maimed, unable, intemperate, dissolute, exhaust through
riot, as he said, they must be wise and able by inheritance. It comes to
pass that our generation is corrupt, we have many weak persons both in
body and mind, many feral diseases raging among us, crazed families; our
fathers bad, and we are like to be worse."
This conception gradually developed into the widespread myth of a
primevally perfect man through the natural operation of that
psychological law whereby, as Macaulay remarks, society, constantly moving
forward with eager speed, is as constantly looking backward with tender
regret. They turn their eyes and see a lake where an hour before they were
toiling through sand.
From this view came the belief that man as existing is degenerate. This
degeneracy, while popularly charged to occult influences, was early
ascribed by scientists to physical causes. Aristotle, as Osborn[4] points
out, appears to have recognised degeneration or the gradual decline of
structures in form and usefulness, in his analysis of "movement" in
connection with development. Degeneration is first met with as a term in
an explanation of the origin of species by Buffon in the eighteenth
century. The conception itself occurs in a criticism by Sylvius of
Vesalius (1514-64), who had asserted that the anatomy of Galen could not
have been founded upon the human body, because he had described an
intermaxillary bone. This bone, Vesalius observed, is found in the lower
animals but not in man. Sylvius (1614-72) defends Galen on the ground that
though man had no intermaxillary bone at present this is no proof of its
absence in Galen's time. "It is luxury, it is sensuality, which has
gradually deprived man of this bone." This passage, as Osborn remarks,
proves that the idea of degeneration of structures through disuse, as well
as the idea of the inheritance of the effect of habit, or the
"transmission of acquired characters," is a very ancient one. Sylvius,
while here recognising factors of degeneracy, erred in considering
disappearance of the intermaxillary bone, not reappearance, as
degeneracy. He failed to recognise, moreover, the law of economy of growth
by which one structure is sacrificed for another or for the organism as a
whole. This law, indicated by Aristotle, but clearly outlined by Goethe in
1807, and Geoffroy St. Hilaire in 1818, underlies the physiological
atrophies and hypertrophies which play such a part in degeneracy.
The _Twelve Cæsars_ of Suetonius (that stud book of imperial degeneracy as
it has been styled) stamps the decided impression on its readers that
Hippocratian notions of degenerate heredity strongly permeated Roman
thought, to revive in those Arabic, Italian, and British (Roger Bacon)
thinkers who created the scientific phase of the revival of learning.
In the science of medicine, as developed by Hippocrates,[5] the modern
conception of degeneracy is evident. Hippocrates argues against the
"sacred" nature of epilepsy, since it is a hereditary disease and hence
comes under the operation of physical law. He furthermore points out, as
did Aristotle, that epilepsy produced in the ancestor by traumatism and
other physical causes may be inherited by the child.
As the degeneration phase of evolution was less antagonistic to the
religious theory forced into biblical dogma by the Jesuit Suarez (in
opposition to the evolutionary views of St. Augustine and St. Thomas
Aquinas), being supported by biblical dicta (that when the fathers had
eaten sour grapes the children's teeth were set on edge) and fetichistic
folklore, it retained a dominance that the advanced phase lost. From the
time of Hippocrates, psychiatry (the science devoted to mental disorders)
continued to accumulate data of the origin and transmission of human
defects. The impetus given the evolutionary explanation of these data by
the seventeenth and eighteenth century biologists (Harvey, Buffon,
Lamarck, Erasmus Darwin, and others) laid the foundation for the modern
doctrine of degeneracy.
Buffon[6] remarks that many species are being perfected or degenerated by
the great changes in land and sea, by the favours or disfavours of Nature,
by food, by the prolonged influences of climate, contrary or favourable,
and are no longer what they formerly were. He regarded temperature, food,
and climate as the three great factors in the alteration and degeneration
of animals.
Erasmus Darwin[7] considers that all life starts from a living filament
having the capability of being excited into action by certain stimuli.
This capability is that whereby plants and animals react to their
environment, causing changes in them which are transmitted to their
offspring. All animals undergo transformations which are in part produced
by their own exertions in response to pleasures and pains, and many of
these acquired forms or propensities are transmitted to their posterity.
Other effects of this excitability (such as constitute hereditary
diseases, like scrofula, epilepsy, insanity) have their origin in one or
perhaps two generations, as in the progeny of those who drink much vinous
spirits. Those hereditary propensities cease again if one or two sober
generations succeed, otherwise the family becomes extinct.
Benjamin Rush[8] (greatly influenced by the Erasmus Darwin school)
remarks that through hereditary sameness of organisation of the nerves,
brain and blood vessels, the predisposition to insanity pervades whole
families and renders them liable to this disease from a transient and
feeble operation of its causes. Insanity when hereditary is excited by
more feeble causes than in persons in whom this predisposition has been
acquired. It generally attacks the descendants in those stages of life in
which it has appeared in the ancestors. Children born previously to the
attack of madness in their parents are less liable to inherit it than
those who are born after it. Children born of parents who are in the
decline of life are more predisposed to insanity than children born under
contrary circumstances. A predisposition to certain diseases, seated in
parts contiguous to the seat of insanity, often descends from parents to
their children. Thus it occurs in a son whose father or mother has been
afflicted only with hysteria or habitual headaches. The reverse likewise
takes place. There are families in which insanity has existed where the
disease has spared the mind in the posterity, but appeared in great
strength and eccentricity of the memory and of the passions, or in great
perversion of their moral faculties. Sometimes it passes by all the
faculties of the mind, and appears only in the nervous system of persons
descended from deranged parents; again, madness occurs in children whose
parents were remarkable only for eccentricity of mind. Among the diseases
that attack the children of the insane, but did not exist in their
ancestors, are consumption and epilepsy.
Similar studies were later published by Pinel, Tissot, Chiarrurgi,
Stedman, Parkman, Brigham, Prichard, Esquirol, Jacobi, and other
American, English, French, Italian, and German alienists. Based upon the
data thus obtained, and upon the general principles thus outlined, then
appeared--nearly at the same time as the like epoch-making work (on
another phase of evolution), Darwin's _Origin of Species_--Morel's
_Treatise on Human Degeneracy_, wherein the principle of natural selection
was shown to involve the recognition of the physical conditions that
constitute degeneracy, and, necessarily, to exclude primeval perfection.
Morel's definition of degeneration as a marked departure from the original
type tending more or less rapidly to the extinction of it, forms the basis
of commonly accepted definitions.
While Morel practically outlined the modern study of degeneracy, his
theologic timidity forced an absolute definition of a state which,
according to his own admission, was purely relative. After fencing
somewhat with the position that there was a primevally perfect man,[9] he
admits with Tessier the primeval lowness of man, but also thinks that the
fall of man could create new conditions which, in his descendants, from
heredity and from causes acting on their health, tended to make them
depart from the primitive type. These departures from the primitive type
have led to varieties, some of which constitute races capable of
transmitting racial characteristics. Other varieties in the races
themselves have created the abnormal states which Morel has denominated
degeneracies. Each of these degeneracies has its own stamp from the cause
that produces it. Their common characteristic is hereditary transmission
under graver conditions than normal heredity. With certain exceptional
instances of regeneration, the progeny of degenerates presents progressive
degradation. This may reach such limits that humanity is preserved by its
excess. It is not necessary, however, that the ultimate stage of
degradation be reached before sterility occurs. Morel confines degeneracy
to a pathologic type, criticising F. Heusinger[10] for applying the term
degenerate to domestic animals which "throw back" to the wild or original
type. Morel's admission that causes influencing health produce deviations
which, under favouring conditions, become racial types capable of
indefinite transmission, saves him from absolute scientific inaccuracy,
but renders inconsistent his limitation of degeneracy. It may be
convenient to separate diseased states from anomalies, but such separation
can only be very relative. From his conservatism and his plentiful data,
Morel aroused much less antagonism than did a contemporary, Moreau (de
Tours), who bore to him the relation of Darwin to Wallace.[11] While
Moreau devotes much attention to the factors of degeneracy and its
stigmata (or marks), like Morel, his main point is the expansion of the
theory of Aristotle which Dryden epigrammatised into--
"Great wit to madness nearly is allied,
And thin partitions do their bounds divide."
As J. G. Kiernan shows,[12] this doctrine, early in the history of the
race, obtained dominance through the evolution of arts, sciences, and
religions from fetichism. Phenomena manifested by fetich priests (of the
Shaman type) so closely resembled epileptic insanity in its frenzies and
visions that the two states were long regarded as identical, whence the
term "_morbus sacer_." The supernatural influences which, in current
belief, underlay epilepsy were, at the outset, malign or benign as they
were offended or placated. They became benign, and the insane were under
protection of a deity, as in Mussulman countries. Later still the
demon-possession theory gained dominance, and at length the demon sank
into disease. Throughout all this evolution the belief in an inherent
affinity between insanity and genius persisted.
Aristotle, in whose day the disease notion was becoming dominant, asserts
that, under the influence of head congestion, persons sometimes become
prophets, sybils, and poets. Thus Mark, the Syracusan, was a pretty fair
poet during a maniacal attack, but could not compose when sane. Men
illustrious in poetry, arts, and statesmanship are often insane, like
Ajax, or misanthropic like Bellerophon. Even at a recent period similar
dispositions are evident in Plato, Socrates, Empedocles, and many others,
above all, the poets.
According to Plato, "Delirium is by no means evil, but when it comes by
gift of the gods, a very great benefit. In delirium the sibyls of Delphi
and Dodona were of great service to Greece, but when in cold blood were of
little or none. Frequently, when the gods afflicted men with epidemics, a
sacred delirium inspired some men with a remedy for these. The Muses
excite some souls to delirium to glorify heroes with poetry, or to
instruct future generations."
Precedent to the works of Morel and Moreau appeared their source and
inspiration, Prosper Lucas's _Natural Heredity_.[13] Here the biologic
current of thought encountered the sociologic current; although the waves
clashed, the two currents merged into and modified each other. The
biologist demonstrated that degenerate types often "threw back" in their
structures, and this very "throwing back" made them the fittest to
survive. The sociologist found that the only test of acquired or inherited
degeneracy in man was disaccord with environment. The co-existent moral
and physical defects resultant on heredity found by Erasmus Darwin, Rush,
Parkman, Grohmann, and others tended to show that all types of defectives
might be a product of heredity.
These stimulating researches into the sources of crime led to a
controversy which reached its height two decades ere the treatise of
Morel. To this controversy three suggestive works owed their origin: a
psychological treatise by Dr. Lauvergne[14] on felons, a romance with a
purpose by Eugène Sue,[15] and a suggestively practical brochure by a
rather corrupt police official, Vidocq.[16] Seemingly conflicting as were
these productions, all strikingly illustrated the influence of heredity
and environment in the production of defectives. To these productions were
soon added those of Moreau (de Tours),[17] Attemyer, Eliza Farnham,[18]
the American Sampson,[19] Dally, Lélut, Camper, and the older Voisin.
Morel[20] laid the foundation of what is widely known as the Lombroso
School by a brochure wherein he proposed to entitle morbid anthropology,
"that part of the science of man the aim of which is to study phenomena
due to morbid influences and to malign heredity."
To the factor of atavism, inconsistently ignored by Morel, the early
embryologic studies of Von Baer and the biologic studies resultant on the
transmutation of species lent special emphasis. Three possibilities of
life await, as Wilson[21] remarks, each living being: either it remains
primitive and unchanged, or it progresses toward a higher type, or it
backslides and retrogresses. The factors underlying the stable state force
the animal to remain as it is; those underlying the progressive tendency
make it more elaborate, while the factors of degeneration, on the other
hand, tend to simplify its structure. It requires no special thought to
perceive that progress is a great fact of nature. The development of every
animal and plant shows the possibilities of nature in this direction. But
the bearings of physiological backsliding are not so clearly seen.
That certain animals degenerate or retrogress in their development is
susceptible of ready and familiar illustration. No better illustration is
needed than is derived from the domain of parasitic existence. When an
animal or plant attaches itself partly or wholly to another living being,
and becomes more or less dependent upon the latter for support and
nourishment, it exhibits, as a rule, retrogression and degeneration. The
parasitic "guest" dependent on its "host" for lodging alone, or it may be
for both board and lodging, is in a fair way to become degraded in
structure, and, as a rule, exhibits marked degradation where the
association has persisted sufficiently long. Parasitism and servile
dependence act very much in structural lower life as analogous instances
of mental dependence on others act on man.
The destruction of characteristic individuality and the extinction of
personality are natural results of that form of association wherein one
form becomes absolutely dependent on another for all the conditions of
life. A life of mere attachment exhibits similar results, and organs of
movement disappear by the law of disuse. A digestive system is a
superfluity to an animal which, like the tapeworm, obtains its food ready
made in the very kitchen, so to speak, of its host. Hence the lack of
digestive apparatus follows the finding of a free commissariat by the
parasite. Organs of sense are not necessary for an attached and rooted
animal; these latter, therefore, go by the board and the nervous system
itself becomes modified and altered. Degradation wholesale and complete is
the penalty the parasite has to pay for its free board and lodging; and in
this fashion Nature may be said to revenge the host for the pains and
troubles wherewith, like Job of old, he may be tormented.
The most emphatic biologic degeneration is that discovered by
Kowalevsky[22] in the sea squirt, which, in its larval state, is a
vertebrate, and when adult is an ascidian, seemingly far below the
cuttlefish and the worms. This strikingly illustrates that, as Ray
Lankester[23] has said, degeneration is a gradual change of structure by
which the organism becomes adapted to less varied and less complex
conditions of life; a reverse of evolution which proceeds from the
indefinite and homogeneous to the definite and heterogeneous with a loss
of explosive force due to the acquirement of inhibitions or checks.
This principle of biologic degeneration, long recognised, was most lucidly
enforced by Dohrn[24], whose views were later extended by Ray Lankester.
The parallelism of animal degeneracy with that of man, so clearly evident
even in the parasitic nature of defectives, was, as Meynert[25] showed,
due to the fact that the fore-brain is an inhibitory apparatus against the
lower and more instinctive natural impulses. The higher its development
the greater is the tendency to subordinate the particular to the general.
Even in insects a high social growth occurs, as in the bee and ant
communities. The same is the case in the development of man; in the
infant, a being entirely wrapped in its instincts of self-preservation,
the "primary ego" is predominant and the child is an egotistic parasite.
As development goes on this standpoint is passed, conscience assumes its
priority, the fore-brain acts as a check on the purely vegetative
functions and the "secondary ego" takes precedence over the primary one;
this is the general order of society, designated as civilisation or social
order. If this inhibition become weakened or disordered, predominance of
the natural instincts or impulses occurs, and when it is totally lost the
individual is in the position of a criminal who opposes the ethical order
of society--a parasite, and one of the worst kind who not only lives upon
his host but destroys him in doing so.
Hence degenerate tendencies are reversions in type indicating the original
source of the inhibition.
The tree of Moreau[26] illustrates clearly the essential principles of
these inter-relations of defect, further elucidated by the observations of
Sander[27] on the connection of deformed central nervous systems with
mental and moral disorder.
_NERVOUS HEREDITY._
{ Science { Music.
Exceptional Intelligence { Arts { Painting.
{ Letters
{ { Paretic dementia.
{ { Paralyses.
{ Brain { Tumours.
Lesions of the Nerve Centres { { Brain Softening.
{ { Congestion.
{
{ { Softening of Spinal
{ Spinal Cord { Cord.
{ { Myelitis.
{ Epilepsy.
{ Chorea.
Neuroses { Stammering.
{ Convulsive Fits.
{ Hysteria.
{ Utopians.
Intellectual States { Eccentrics.
{ Mixed Conditions.
{ Prostitutes.
Emotional States { Criminals.
{ Unstable.
Neuralgia { External.
{ Internal.
{ { Symptomatical.
{ Acute Insanity { Idiopathic.
{ { Alcoholic.
Psychoses { Imbecility
{ Idiocy { General Insanity.
{ Chronic Insanity { Dementia.
{ Partial Insanity.
{ Congenital
{ Blindness.
Special and General Conditions of the Senses { Anæsthesiæ.
{ Deafness.
{ Hyperæsthesiæ.
Nutritional Defect.
The extensive studies of Niepce,[28] Vogt,[29] and others on idiot biology
sought to show that the brain was not merely arrested in development, but
sometimes reverted even as low as the sauropsida type (reptiles and
birds). Grohmann,[30] as early as 1820, had "often been impressed in
criminals, especially in those of defective development, by the prominent
ears, the shape of the cranium, the projecting cheek-bones, the large
lower jaws, the deeply placed eyes, the shifty, animal-like gaze."
Maudsley[31] observes that in the case of such an extreme morbid variety
as a congenital idiot we have to do with a defective nervous organisation.
Marchand, in the brain of two idiots of European descent, found the
convolutions fewer in number, individually less complex, broader and
smoother than in the apes. The condition results neither from atrophy nor
mere arrest of growth, but consists essentially in an imperfect evolution
of the cerebral hemispheres or their parts, dependent on an arrest of
development. The proportion of the weight of brain to that of body is
extraordinarily diminished. With the brain of the orang type comes a
corresponding defect of function. With this animal type of brain in idiocy
sometimes appear animal traits and instincts. One class of idiots is
justly designated theroid, so brute-like are its members.
The human brain in the course of foetal development passes through the
same stages as other vertebrate brains, and to some extent these
transitional stages resemble the permanent forms of their brain. Summing
up, as it were, in itself the leading forms of vertebrate type, there is
truly a brute brain within the man's, and when the latter stops short of
its characteristic development, it is natural that it should manifest only
its most primitive functions.
It must, however, be pointed out that the human brain, even of the idiot
or microcephales, never resembles, _as a whole_, the brain of any
anthropoid or lower animal form. Such a position was maintained by Vogt,
but has long since been abandoned. The existing anthropoid apes are not
the ancestors of man, and have pursued a different development.[32]
Despine's[33] researches revealed the absence of human checks on the
instinctive tendencies in criminals. He, however, started from the
doctrine of moral imbecility as elaborated by Rush, Prichard, Brigham,
Ray, Galt, and others. Bruce Thomson,[34] testing Despine's results by
primitive races and Scotch criminals, found that defective, abnormal, and
anomalous states of the instinctive faculties exist in entire races and in
the "moral idiots" that occur in the best races. Criminals form a variety
of the human family quite distinct from law-abiding men. A low type of
physique indicating a deteriorated character gives a family likeness due
to the fact that they form a community which retrogrades from generation
to generation. The low physical condition of juvenile criminals in
reformatories, &c., becomes at once obvious if they be compared with
healthy, active school children. They are puny, sickly, scrofulous, often
deformed, with peculiar, unnaturally developed heads, sluggish, stupid,
liable to fits, mean in figure, and defective in vital energy, while at
the same time they are irritable, violent, and too often quite
incorrigible. The adults usually have a singularly stupid and insensate
look. The complexion is bad. The outlines of the head are harsh and
angular. The boys are ugly in feature, and have, as a rule, repulsive
appearances. These diseases of criminals are a proof of their low type and
deteriorated condition. Their deaths are mainly due to tubercular diseases
and affections of the nervous system. In the greater number crime is
hereditary, a tendency which is, in most cases, associated with bodily
defect, such as spinal deformities, stammering or other imperfect speech,
club-foot, cleft-palate, hare-lip, deformed jaws and teeth, deaf-mutism,
congenital blindness, paralysis, epilepsy, and scrofula.
Elisha Harris,[35] of New York, among 233 convicts found 54 to belong to
families in which insanity, epilepsy, and other neuroses existed.
Eighty-three per cent. belonged to a criminal, pauper, or inebriate stock,
and were, therefore, hereditarily or congenitally affected. Nearly 76 per
cent. of their number hence proved habitual criminals. According to
Harris, crime, pauperism, and insanity revert into each other, so that
insanity in the parent produces crime or pauperism in the offspring, or,
_vice versâ_, crime or pauperism in the parent produces disease or
insanity in the offspring. Campagne, Broca, G. Wilson, and others about
the same time made similar researches.
The American sociologist, Samuel Royce, after a careful study of American
and European defective classes,[36] found that observation of the
hereditary nature of pauperism which congenitally reverts into insanity,
disease or crime, leaves no doubt but that pauperism is one of the worst
forms of race deterioration, and that the paralysis of the human will and
its energies is but the result of a fearful dissolution in progress.
Extensive researches made by Charles S. Hoyt,[37] of the New York State
Board of Charities (1874), into the origin of the defective classes of
that state, show that the pauper, hysteric, epileptic, prostitute,
criminal, born-blind, deaf-mute, paranoiac, recurrent lunatic and idiot
were buds of the same tree of degenerate heredity. E. C. Spitzka,[38]
basing his researches on the principles of Morel as expanded and
critically applied by Meynert,[39] reached essentially the same results as
also did Westphal, Krafft-Ebing, Grille, Kerlin, Axel Key, Magnan,
Foville, Bjornstrom, Amadei, Schüle, Nicolson,[40] Tonnini, Tamburini,
Verga, Tamassia, Kowalevsky, and it may be said the German Psychiatrical
Society (which, by accepting a conception of the distortion of mental
faculties otherwise seemingly high, based on brain deformity rather than
disease, accepted the degeneracy doctrine of to-day).
For several decades, moreover, the stigmata of degeneracy have appeared in
French, German, Austrian, Russian, Italian, and Scandinavian court reports
as evidence of hereditary defects.
As often happens in science--
"Thought by thought is piled till some great truth
Is loosened and the nations echo round."
Wherefore about this period (1870-78) appeared the first volume of the
epoch-making work of Cesare Lombroso,[41] who, erroneously credited with
being the apostle of the modern doctrine of degeneracy, has admittedly
done more to stimulate research than any other investigator. This work
exerted an influence at first in Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Russia,
and the Scandinavian countries, while on the English-speaking countries,
despite the apparently fertile soil prepared for it, its influence was
seemingly slight. Under the degradation produced in many American
charitable and correctional institutions by corruption, naturally
resultant on a civil war, science therein was at a decided discount
between 1861 and 1881. A school arose which, defying the individualistic
rule of English common law underlying the institutions of the United
States, pandered to mob-law and theologic prejudice by denying certain
well-ascertained facts in human degeneracy. This school, represented at
the Guiteau trial by the experts for the prosecution, denied heredity and
that moral defect could result from physical abnormality. This school,
however, was by no means representative of American psychiatry or
sociology. Rush, Brigham, James MacDonald, Gait, McFarland, W. W. Godding,
Ray, C. H. Hughes, Kerlin, Patterson, Wilbur, Fisher, J. H. McBride, C. H.
Nichols, C. A. Folsom, Cowles, and others accepted Morel's principles.
Spitzka,[42] long ere the trial, pointed out that criminals displayed the
stigmata of Morel, and that the more intellectual types of insanity were
based on brain deformity rather than disease.
Benedikt,[43] of Vienna, in 1879 stated that "criminals generally have
nothing analogous to monomaniacs. They tend to develop distinct
peculiarities of organisation and psychic features, and these
peculiarities are the product of their social condition." J. G.
Kiernan,[44] reviewing his work, remarked that any one who had at all
examined the question would be convinced that between the true criminal
type, the imbecile and the paranoiac (_primäre verrückt_) the
psychological relations and their anatomical bases are intimate and close.
Had Benedikt examined the insane and criminals, not for convolutional
aberrations alone, but also for heterotopias, &c., he would never have
written the sentence just quoted.
W. W. Godding,[45] commenting on the evidence of J. P. Gray,[46] the
leader of the American school that denies degeneracy, feelingly remarked
that "the disordered mind does not cease to be a unit although the
observed manifestations of its insanity may seem to be confined in some
cases to the emotion; in others to the affection; and in still others to
the intellectual powers. We cannot deny that the old masters were as
keen-sighted observers as ourselves. I dislike to hear drunkenness called
dipsomania, as I so often do; but I do not therefore say that dipsomania
is only drunkenness. It might improve my standing with the legal
fraternity if I should pronounce kleptomania only another name for
stealing, but my personal observations convince me that the insane have
sometimes a disposition to steal, which is a direct result of their
disease, and for which they are no more accountable than the puerperal
maniac is for her oaths.
"And now, after all these years of careful research, and our asylum
reports[47] rendered bulky with long tables prepared with so much care,
involving inquiry on the origin of the disease not alone in the direct
family line, but in the collateral branches also; just when the medical
profession has come to believe that if one fact in medical science be
better established than another, it is that insanity is hereditary, and we
undertake in the present case to look up hereditary predisposition, and
the family disposition likewise, we are met with the withering conundrum,
'Can a man inherit insanity from his uncle?' and we are told that there is
no such thing as hereditary insanity. Yes, gentlemen, I understand you;
the tendency to the disease is inherited. And so in the strict use of
language there is no such thing as insane delusion; but we know that
language is seldom used with scientific exactness, and no one is at a loss
to understand what we mean when we say that Jones is full of insane
delusions, insanity being hereditary in his family. Yes, and if Jones
should marry an insane woman, the chances are good that Jones's son will
turn out crazy, no matter how carefully he may be brought up under the
direction of the most eminent psychist, for that little germ which you
call 'a tendency'--so minute that it will elude your most careful scrutiny
with scalpel and microscope--is a fixed fact, and will prove more potent
than all theories. Not born there; develops. Ah, how is it that science
shows us that syphilis and small-pox and tubercle are born in the
offspring, that the infant comes into the world with spina bifida,
idiotic, hydrocephalic, acephalic, that the child is blind and mute and
misshapen in his mother's womb, but is never insane? Because, forsooth, we
have seen fit to limit insanity to disease of the brain, and disease is
not inherited. Is it possible that in all these years it has not been Dr.
Gray's lot as it has been mine to be consulted about those 'queer'
children of insane parentage, who are perverse from the start? Will he say
that the perverseness is only a 'badness' which should be whipped out of
the child? But that has generally been thoroughly tried before the
physician is consulted. Heterodox I know it is, but observed facts compel
me to be heterodox with Prichard and Esquirol and Ray, with Morel and
Griesinger and Maudsley, and I know not how many others, in recognising in
some cases a condition of inherent defect born in the individual, and not
a result of education--a condition which writers have recognised under
various names as hereditary mental disorder, insane diathesis, insane
temperament."
The Guiteau trial so stimulated studies of degeneracy that two experts for
the prosecution, A. McL. Hamilton[48] and H. M. Stearns,[49] later changed
their views as to degeneracy, while C. L. Dana, a strong supporter of the
Gray school in 1881, subsequently made valuable contributions to the
literature of the degeneracy stigmata. The position then taken by Spitzka
and Kiernan as to the cerebral basis of degeneracy was in 1882 supported
by H. Howard,[50] of Montreal; Workman,[51] of Toronto; Kerlin,[52] of
Pennsylvania; Osler,[53] of Baltimore; and C. K. Mills,[54] of
Philadelphia.
It was during 1881, moreover, that Jacobi made extensive studies of
degeneracy in royalty and aristocracy,[55] as earlier had Ireland.[56]
From the time of Itard degenerate phenomena in idiots had been traced to
cerebral mal-development. Kerlin[57] pointed out that "epileptic change"
in them was marked by moral alteration similar in explosive characters to
that so frequently observed in criminals. In England students of idiocy
like Clouston, Shuttleworth, Beach, Ireland, Langdon Down, and others, had
early brought the recognition of its inter-relations with insanity, crime
and neuroses into strong relief. To the studies of Bruce Thomson,
Maudsley, and Nicolson, Tyndall[58] gave strong support from the actual
experience of a governor of a great British prison, who found that the
prisoners in his charge might be divided into three distinct classes: the
first class consisted of persons who ought never to have been in prison;
external accident and not internal taint had brought them within the grasp
of the law, and what had happened to them might happen to most of us; they
were essentially men of sound moral stamina, though wearing the prison
garb. Then came the largest class, formed of individuals possessing no
strong bias, moral or immoral, plastic to the touch of circumstances which
would mould them into either good or evil members of society. Thirdly,
came a class, happily not a large one, whom no kindness could conciliate
and no discipline tame. They were sent into the world labelled
"incorrigible," wickedness being stamped, as it were, upon their
organisation.
With the close of the year 1883 the degeneracy doctrine may be regarded as
having practically been accepted in biology, in anthropology, in
sociology, in criminology, in psychiatry, and general pathology. Debate
was henceforth not as to its existence, but as to its limitations.
Precedent to 1835 determinism in popular thought due to Calvinistic
predestination had, in English-speaking countries, fought for the
doctrine; subsequent thereto the theologic reaction against Calvinism was
a strong opposing force, whose influence was finally destroyed by the
practically general acceptance of the doctrine of evolution in the late
seventies.
CHAPTER II
THE STIGMATA OF DEGENERACY
The attempt made by Morel to limit the doctrine of degeneracy to the
domain of the morbid proved impossible, because of the rapid accumulation
of data by his own school, which demonstrated that atavistic deformity
played a larger part in the production of diseases. Bland Sutton does not
too forcibly put this result when he states[59] that if it be difficult to
define disease when restricted to the human family, it becomes obviously
more difficult when disease is investigated on a broad biological basis.
As the great barrier which exists between man and those members of his
class most closely allied to him consists not in structural characters but
in mental power, it necessarily follows that there should be a similarity
in the structural alterations induced by diseased conditions in all kinds
of animals, allowing of course for the difference in environment. This is
known to be the case, and it is clear that as there has been a gradual
evolution of complex from simple organisms, it necessarily follows that
the principles of evolution ought to apply to diseased conditions if they
hold good for the normal or healthy states or organism; in plain words,
there has been an evolution of disease _pari passu_ with evolution of
animal forms. For a long time it has been customary to talk of physiologic
types of diseased tissues; Sutton's earlier efforts were directed to
searching among animals for the purpose of detecting in them the
occurrence of tissues, which in man are only found under abnormal
conditions. The statement proved to be true in a limited sense. At the
same time the truth of an opinion held by nearly all thoughtful
physicians, that disease may in many instances be regarded as an
exaggerated function, was forcibly illustrated; the manifestations of
disease were found to be regulated by the same law which governs
physiological processes in general, and many conditions regarded as
pathological in one animal were revealed as physiological in another.
The doctrine, therefore, has its scope limited only by biologic data. It
of necessity begins with the cell itself in its relation to other cells of
that practically compound organism which constitutes a single vertebrate.
The cell may, therefore, degenerate as a single member of that organism,
producing danger or benefit to the other cells. Thus the cancer cell
degenerates in its power of reproduction below the tissue to which it
belongs. It is peculiarly true here, as has been said by Herbert Spencer,
that every vertebrate is an aggregate whose internal actions are adapted
to counterbalance its external actions; hence the preservation of its
movable equilibrium depends upon its development and the proper number of
these actions; the movable equilibrium may be ruined when one of these
actions is too great or too small, and through deficiency or need of some
organic or inorganic cause in its surroundings. Every individual can
adapt itself to these changeable influences in two ways, either directly
or by producing new individuals who will take the place of those whom the
equilibrium has destroyed. Therefore there exist forces preservative and
destructive of the race. As it is impossible that these two kinds of force
should counterbalance each other, it is necessary that the equilibrium
should re-establish itself in an orderly way. Since there are two
preservative forces of every animal group--the impulse of every individual
to self-preservation and the impulse to the production of other
individuals--these faculties must vary in an inverse ratio; the former
must diminish when the second augments. Degeneration constitutes a process
of disintegration, the reverse of integration. Hence, if the term
individuation be applied to all the processes which complete and sustain
the life of the individual, and that of generation to those which aid the
formation and development of new individuals, individuation and generation
are necessarily antagonistic.
In the phenomena of unisexual generation we see that the larger organisms
never reproduce themselves in the unisexual way, while the smaller
organisms reproduce themselves with the greatest rapidity by this method.
Between these two extremes unisexual reproduction decreases while the size
increases. In the history of all plants and animals is evident the
physiologic truth, that while the general growth of the individual
proceeds rapidly, the reproductive organs remain imperfectly developed and
inactive. On the contrary, the principle of reproduction indicates
decrease in the intensity of growth and becomes a cause of cessation.
Great fecundity is always attended by great mortality. Each superior
degree of organic evolution is accompanied by an inferior degree of
fecundity. The greater the germs the less is the individuation, and _vice
versâ_. The greater and more complex the organisation, the less is the
power of multiplication.
What is true of the cells is also true of organs composed of them. Each
organ can be regarded as a distinct animal (a parasite is preferable for
comparison) which has its own nervous system (the ganglia), but is fed and
controlled by the organism as a whole. Degeneration of this organ may
therefore be an expression of a local state peculiar to it and either
beneficial or maleficent, or both in inverse degree, to the organism as a
whole, or it may be the expression of a general defect in the whole
organism. The sclerotic states of the appendix vermiformis in man and of
the human liver are, as Kiernan has shown, two excellent illustrations of
the degeneracies last described. Man, in common with the four anthropoid
apes, has a little thin tube attached to the cæcum known as the appendix
vermiformis. In the early embryo it is equal in calibre to the other
bowels, but ceases to grow proportionately after a certain time. In the
new-born child it is almost as large as in the adult. As this tube proved
disadvantageous to man's precursor (as it does to certain mammals) from
catching foreign bodies which form the nucleus of enteroliths or bowel
stones, it has lost the nutritive supply of the other intestines and is
tending to disappear. It is often absent in man. The defect in its
structure, while predisposing to the attacks of germs and an expression of
its own degeneracy, is an evidence of an advance in evolution in the
organism as a whole by which great danger and waste of nutritive force
are avoided.
Recent researches[60] have shown that "hob-nail" liver, once supposed to
be due entirely to abuse of alcohol, usually occurs in states of
congenital deficiency in persons of defective heredity. The change in the
appendix which is tending to cause its disappearance is essentially a
sclerosis, and hence is morbid, considered from the appendix standpoint
alone. As the same process occurs in "hob-nail" liver, it is obvious that
degeneracy may be an expression of general advance and local defect or may
be a local expression of general defect. The same phenomenon is seen in
the nervous system. The researches of Cunningham[61] have shown that in
man the struggle for existence between the sympathetic and the
cerebro-spinal system has ended in the victory of the latter, while the
first is tending to disappear. Such changes must necessarily result in
local degeneracies which are for the benefit of the organism as a whole.
Degeneracy on this basis may express itself in simple disturbance of the
lower or nutritive functions. The uric acid or gouty states, for example,
are, as Fothergill long ago pointed out, assumptions by mammalian organs
of the functions of those of birds and reptiles. In conditions like
myxoedema the skin, through thyroid gland disturbances, takes on features
which resemble in result those found in certain mollusks and low fish.
These nutritive disturbances may show themselves in disorders of the
pituitary body (acromegaly, giantism, &c.), whereby the bony system of man
reverts to conditions like those of the gorilla. The same conditions also
appear in the diathesis of the "bleeders." All these conditions, however,
may be an expression of a degenerate type assuming a normal equilibrium,
as well as of a normal organism taking the first steps in degeneracy.
In a general way, therefore, as Dohrn has pointed out, this principle
holds good of man not only as an organic unit but as a compound organism.
Degeneracy[62] is a gradual change of structures by which the organism
becomes adapted to less varied and less complex conditions of life. The
opposite progression process of elaboration is a gradual change of
structure in which the organism becomes adapted to more and more varied
and complex conditions of existence. In elaboration there is a new
expression of form corresponding to new perfection of work in the animal
machine. In degeneracy there is suppression of form corresponding to the
cessation of work. Elaboration of some one organ may be a necessary
accompaniment of degeneracy in all the others. This is very generally the
case. Only when the total result of the elaboration of some organs, and
the degeneracy of others, is such as to leave the whole mass in a lower
condition--that is, fitted to less complex action and reaction in regard
to its surroundings than is the type--can the individual be regarded as an
instance of degeneracy. These degeneracies appear at varying periods,
since struggles for existence on the part of the different organs and
systems of the body are most ardent during periods of body evolution and
involution. During foetal life, during the first dentition, during the
second dentition (often as late as the thirteenth year), during puberty
and adolescence (fourteen to twenty-five), during the climacteric (forty
to sixty), when uterine involution occurs in woman and prostatic
involution in man, and finally during senility (sixty and upwards), during
all these periods degeneracy may be shown by mental or physical defect, a
congenital tendency to which has remained latent until the period of
stress. These defects may be such biochemic alterations (undemonstrable by
existing methods) as lead to diminished inhibitory power or other altered
function, or to secondary pathologic or teratologic change of decidedly
demonstrable nature. Organs and structures checked at a certain phase of
development may pursue a course of development differing from that pointed
out in man but outlined in other vertebrates. The human cyclopean
monstrosities, for example, might be regarded as reversions to the
single-eyed sea-squirts, who are possibly the Ascidian precursors of the
vertebrates.
The scope of degeneracy may therefore be limited to certain signs which
are its sole expressions. These signs (stigmata as they were early called)
may be the only expression of degeneracy, and their significance must be
determined by a careful examination of the organism in which these
expressions are found, since they may be merely defects produced by
degeneracy, or may indicate how deep such degeneracy has penetrated. They
may, therefore, indicate either slight or serious defect. In proportion to
the depth of degeneracy in the organism will the stigmata affect the
earlier simpler or later complicated acquisitions through evolution. Of
necessity, when the organism is affected by degeneracy, the morbid element
will take the line of least resistance, determined by the depth of
degeneracy as well as the variability of the structures concerned. The
same influence must equally affect functions of the structures.
Furthermore, expressions of degeneracy will, as already stated, be
influenced by the periods of stress; the first and second dentition,
puberty, the climacteric and the senile period. In a general way these
stigmata are divisible into mental and physical, and are best observable
in their relations to the periods of stress. In certain races, as in
certain animals, conditions appearing before puberty was completed cannot
be considered as settling the position of the animal in evolution. What is
true of individuals is also true of classes. The anthropoid apes and the
negroes are much higher in physical characteristics, with potential mental
results, before puberty than after. The infant ape, as Havelock Ellis[63]
points out, is very much nearer to man than the adult ape. "The infant ape
is higher in the line of evolution than the adult, and the female ape, by
approximating to the infant type, is somewhat higher than the male. Man,
in carrying on the line of evolution, started not from some adult male
simian, but from the infant ape and, in a less degree, from the female
ape. The human infant bears precisely the same relation to his species as
the simian infant bears to his, and we are bound to conclude that his
relation to the future evolution of the race is similar. The human infant
presents, in an exaggerated form, the chief distinctive characteristics of
humanity--the large head and brain, the small face, the hairlessness, the
delicate bony system. By some strange confusion of thought we usually
ignore this fact, and assume that the adult form is more highly developed
than the infantile form. From the point of view of adaptation to the
environment, it is undoubtedly true that the coarse, hairy, large-boned
and small-brained gorilla is better fitted to make his way in the world
than his delicate offspring; but from a zoological point of view we
witness anything but progress. In man, from about the third year onwards,
further growth--though an absolutely necessary adaptation to the
environment--is to some extent growth in degeneration and senility. It is
not carried to so low a degree as in the apes, although by it man is to
some extent brought nearer to the apes, and among the higher human races
the progress towards senility is less marked than among the lower human
races. The child of many African races is scarcely, if at all, less
intelligent than the European child, but while the African as he grows up
becomes stupid and obtuse, and his whole social life falls into a state of
hide-bound routine, the European retains much of his childlike vivacity.
And if we turn to what we are accustomed to regard as the highest human
types, as represented in men of genius, we shall find a striking
approximation to the child type." The face, in its contest for existence
with the brain, has finally caused both the cranium and the jaws to assume
(for defence and food purposes) a lower type, although as regards existing
functions and the higher standpoint of environment the infantile type must
be considered the higher. Still a casual glance at the Ascidian tadpole
shows that deficient as is the development of the ganglia afterward
forming the medulla, the face is still more deficient. The face, as Minot
shows,[64] is a characteristic of the higher vertebrates, and acquires
increased importance with rise in the evolution. The position of the face
in embryonic development is originally determined by the head-bend. If a
median, longitudinal section of the head be imagined to occupy a
rectangular area divided into quarters, then the lower posterior quarter
corresponds to the mouth region, the other three-quarters to the brain. As
development progresses, the mouth quarter so disproportionately enlarges
in relation to the rest of the head as to project forward in front of the
fore-brain. In this stage, which is represented by the adult amphibians,
the bulk of the facial apparatus is very great, proportionately to the
cranium. In the reptiles the mouth region is elongated still further in
front of the brain-case, resulting in the long snout. In mammals a third
stage is established by the great increase in size of the brain,
especially of the cerebral hemispheres. In consequence the brain comes to
extend over the snout, as it were; in man, whose brain has the maximum
enlargement, the facial apparatus is almost entirely covered by the brain.
In the course of evolution the face, while serviceable to the animal for
certain reasons of general constitutional character (food-getting, means
of defence and means of obtaining mates), is less so than brain growth. A
struggle for existence, therefore, inevitably results between the tendency
of the face to appropriate power of growth and the like tendency of the
brain, which, in defective organisms, produces marked reversions of the
one for the benefit of the other. This struggle is further complicated by
the embryonic relations to both of the hypophysis, since this body
admittedly exerts an influence over bone growth, most markedly (but
abnormally) exhibited in acromegaly (excessive bone growth). In this
contest for existence in the degenerate types, degeneracy will, of
necessity, take the direction of least resistance. As the brain is the
last acquirement in vertebrates, considered from the standpoint of
necessity, while the face (also a late acquirement) is much less complex,
the last, obviously, will present the derangements from degeneration in
shape, while the former will show these in shape and function.
Furthermore, during the embryonic period the development of the brain
will, of necessity, be more immediately affected by degeneracy than the
face, which will gain in evolution at its expense. The stigmata of
degeneracy, therefore, most likely to attract attention are in the order
given, those of the face, jaws, and teeth; ear, eye, cranium; body, bodily
functions; brain and spinal cord. Under these last are to be included
their mental and nervous functions.
The following table summarizes in practical form these stigmata[65]:--
{ { Crime.
{ Ethical { Prostitution and Sexual Degeneracy.
{ Degeneracy. { Moral Insanity, Pauperism, and Inebriety.
{
{ { Paranoia.
{ { Adolescent Insanity.
{ { Periodical Insanity.
Cerebral. { Intellectual { Hysteria.
{ Degeneracy. { Epilepsy.
{ { Neuroses.
{ { One-sided Genius.
{ { Idiocy.
{
{ Sensory { Deaf-Mutism.
{ Degeneracy. { Congenital Colour Blindness.
{ { Smell Abnormalities.
Spinal Various congenital and hereditary disorders
{ Exophthalmic Goître.
{ Lymphoid Degeneracy.
{ Acromegaly.
{ Tissue Instability.
{ Adenoids.
{ Myxoedema.
Nutritive { Plural Births.
Degeneracy { Bleeders.
{ Cancer.
{ Excessive Fecundity.
{ Gout.
{ Early Lipomatosis.
{ Jaws.
{ Cleft Palate.
{ Teeth.
{ Primitive Uteri.
Local { Cloacal conditions (and allied male states)
Reversionary { Horseshoe Kidney and allied states.
Tendencies. { Cyclopian Monstrosities.
{ Amelia and Polymelia, Club feet, &c.
{ Plural mammæ.
{ Simian muscular and bony states.
{ Liver and other organ reversions.
The factors producing degeneration act by causing nervous exhaustion in
the first generation. This implies a practical degeneration in function
since tone is lost.
Every nerve cell has two functions, one connected with sensation or
motion, and the other with growth. If the cell be tired by excessive work
along the line of sensation or motion the function as regards growth
becomes later impaired, and it not only ceases to continue in strength,
but becomes self-poisoned. Each of the organs (heart, liver, kidneys, &c.)
has its own system of nerves (the sympathetic ganglia), which while under
control by the spinal cord and brain act independently. If these nerves
become tired the organ fails to perform its function, the general system
becomes both poisoned and ill-fed, and nervous exhaustion results. In most
cases, however, the brain and spinal cord are first exhausted. The nerves
of the organs are thus allowed too free play, and exhaust themselves
later. This systemic exhaustion has local expression in the testicles in
the male, in the womb and ovaries in the female. Through this the body is
imperfectly supplied with natural tonics (antitoxins) formed by the
structures, and the general nervous exhaustion becomes still more
complete. All the organs of the body are weakened in their function.
Practically the neurasthenic in regard to his organs has taken on a
degenerative function albeit not degenerating in structure, since the
restlessness of the organs is a return to the undue expenditure of force
which occurs in the lower animals in proportion as it is unchecked by a
central nervous system. Through the influence of various exhausting
agencies the spinal cord and the brain lose the gains of evolution and the
neurasthenic is no longer adjusted to environment. Since the reproductive
organs suffer particularly, children born after the acquirement of nervous
exhaustion, more or less checked in development as the influence of
atavism is healthy or not, repeat degenerations in the structure of their
organs, which in the parent were represented by neurasthenic disorders in
function. As the ovaries of the neurasthenic women generally exhibit
prominently the effects of the nervous exhaustion, the offspring of these
do not retain enough vigour to pass through the normal process of
development.
CHAPTER III
HEREDITY AND ATAVISM
Heredity, like other biologic factors, starts with the cell. As elsewhere
pointed out, reproduction is first unicellular in type and involves an
expenditure of nutritive force antagonistic to the growth of the cell. As
Geddes remarks,[66] no one can dispute that the nutritive, vegetative, or
self-regarding processes within the plant or animal are as opposed to the
reproductive, multiplying, species-regarding processes, as income to
expenditure or as building up to breaking down. But within the ordinary
nutritive or vegetative functions of the body there is necessarily a
continuous antithesis between two tissue-changing sets of processes,
constructive and destructive metabolism. The contrast between these two
processes is seen throughout nature, whether in the alternating phases of
cell-life or in the great antithesis of growth and reproduction.
The starfish, deprived of an arm, replaces this by a fresh growth; crabs
can renew the great claws which they have lost in fighting; even as high
up as the lizard the loss of a leg or a tail can be made good. In a great
variety of cases a kind of physiological forgiveness is shown in the
reparation of even serious injuries. Now this "regeneration," as it is
called, is a process of reproduction. By continuous growth the cells of a
persistent stump are able to reproduce the entire number. A sponge, a
hydra or a sea-anemone may be cut into pieces with the result that each
fragment grows into a new organism. The same is done with many plants; and
though the division is artificial the result shows how very far from
unique is the process spoken of as reproduction, which is but more or less
discontinuous growth. This is well shown in the evolution onward
insensibly from cases of continuous budding, as in sponge or rosebush, to
discontinuous budding in hydra zoophyte and tiger-lily, where the
offspring vegetatively produced are sooner or later set free.
The enormous expenditure of force required for unicellular reproduction is
lessened by conjugation with another cell through satisfaction of cell
hunger; and this, by making two cells do the work of one, lessens the
amount of nutritive force expended by each. Evolution in fertilisation has
the following steps:--
I. Formation of plasmodia.
II. Multiple conjugation.
III. Conjugation of the two similar cells.
IV. Union of incipiently dimorphic (different) cells.
V. Fertilisation of differentiated sex elements.
As Maupas has shown, by the time conjugation of two similar cells is
reached, the paranucleus in both is incipiently hermaphroditic. The
impelling force leading to conjugation is, as Rolph has shown, cell
hunger. Conjugation, he remarks, is a necessity for satisfaction, a
gnawing hunger which drives the animal to engulf its neighbour, to
isophagy (self-eating). The process of conjugation is only a special form
of nutrition which occurs because of a reduction of the nutritive income
or an increase of the nutritive needs. It is an "isophagy" which occurs in
place of "heterophagy" (eating of others). "The less nutritive, and
therefore smaller, hungrier, and more mobile organism is the male, the
more nutritive and usually relatively more quiescent organism the female.
Therefore, too, is it that the small starving male seeks out the large,
well-nourished female for purpose of conjugation, to which the latter, the
larger and better nourished, is on its own motive less inclined." The
unicellular type of reproduction long remains after sex differentiation
has occurred and assumes the form of parthenogenesis (virgin generation).
The phenomena of this demonstrate that the female element is the highest
in evolution. Spitzka[67] has shown that the ovum possesses an inherent
activity independently of fructification. How far this may extend in the
direction of more mature development is shown by what is known about
parthenogenesis. This is the development of living beings without a
father. Bees, some butterflies, ants and wasps notoriously multiply their
kind without sexual congress. As a rule the parthenogenetic offspring are
themselves incapable of further procreating their kind. But to this there
are remarkable exceptions. The aphides multiply for many generations
without the intervention of a male. Weigenbergh has shown that the
silk-moth can be propagated as long as the male element is permitted to
act at every fourth generation. The _Artemsia salina_, a minute
crustacean living in saline springs, reproduces its kind for years
without a male being present, males being produced at definite intervals
only (Von Siebold). Among the vertebrata parthenogenetic development has
also been observed, though rarely reaching maturity. Thus, segmentation
occurs in unfertilised ova of the chicken (Oellacher), of the fish
(Burnett and Agassiz), and of frogs (Moquia-Tanden). Spitzka has seen a
blastoderm form in unfertilised ova of the toad-fish (_Batrachus tau_).
Hensen isolated the oviducts of a rabbit, thus rendering the admission of
semen impossible, while the ova, discharged at heat, were compelled to
remain in these oviducts. Three years later he killed the animal and found
the ova had developed into twisted, club-shaped, hollow sacs. The
development in the female ovary (also, though very rarely, in the male
testicle and parotid gland, which show such a remarkable metastatic
sympathy in mumps), of dermoid cysts (containing bones recognisable as
maxillaries with teeth, hair, and skin, rudimentary bowel, gland, and
brain traces), even in undoubted virgins, proves that even the human ovum
is capable of parthenogenetic development. While such development, so far
as known to science, is always abortive, and while, as Washington Irving
remarks, the ingenious maiden who to-day would attribute conception to any
other cause than sexual congress would find it difficult to overcome the
prejudice of scientists, yet embryology, while declaring immaculate
generation improbable, does not pronounce it impossible. A worker bee may
be an offspring of an unimpregnated queen bee. What is a regular
occurrence in one class of animals is sometimes observed as an
exceptional one in another class. If the startling and apparently
miraculous nature of a virgin generation of a living child be regarded as
the sole objection to receiving such a fact, its defender might urge that
the virgin generation of a dermoid cyst with all the traces, however
aborted, of vertebrate organisation, is only a shade less startling and
miraculous.
This power of parthenogenesis, however, cannot continue indefinitely
without extinction. This has been shown by the careful experiments of
Maupas, who had observed 215 generations of an infusorian without sexual
union. He found that then the family became extinct. Powers of nutrition,
division, and conjugation with unrelated forms come to a standstill. The
first symptom of this senile degeneration is decrease in size, which may
go on till the individuals only measure a quarter of their normal
proportions. Various internal structures then follow suit "until at last
formless abortions occur, incapable of living and reproducing themselves."
The nuclear changes are no less momentous. The important paranucleus is
fatally sterile. The larger nucleus may also become affected, "the
chromatin gradually disappears altogether." Physiologically, too, the
organisms become manifestly weaker, though there is excessive sexual
excitation. Such senile decay of the individuals and of the isolated
family inevitably ends in death. Sexual union in those infusorians,
dangerous perhaps for the individual life, a loss of time so far as
immediate multiplication is concerned, is, in a new sense, necessary for
the species. The life runs in cycles of a sexual division which are
strictly limited. Conjugation with unrelated forms must occur else the
whole life ebbs. Without it the protozoa, which some have called
"immortal," die a natural death. Conjugation is the necessary condition of
their eternal youth and immortality.
Starting from this standpoint the relative functions of the two sexes in
heredity are apparent. The original function of reproduction, that of cell
division, is the part of the female. The male in the lower instances
simply supplies the female with nutriment. Thus in certain plants there is
nothing but a subtle osmosis between the sexes. This is also the case with
some of the lower infusoria. With a rise in evolution protoplasm becomes
differentiated. At the outset of the subject of heredity it is evident,
therefore, that the female furnishes the type which is best capable of
development when properly nourished by a highly developed male. To
deficiencies in both particulars are due defects and variations in the
offspring. As the product of fructification is longest under the nutritive
control of the female, her influence is most emphatic in either redeeming
defects or producing them. Heredity, according to Ribot, Spitzka, Féré,
and others, is divisible into direct heredity, indirect heredity, and,
more dubiously, telegony. Direct heredity consists in the transmission of
paternal and maternal qualities to the children. This form of heredity has
two aspects: (1) The child takes after father and mother equally as
regards both physical and moral characters, a case strictly speaking of
very rare occurrence; or (2) the child, while taking after both parents,
more especially resembles one of them. Here again distinction must be made
between two cases. The first of these is when the heredity takes place in
the same sex from father to son, from mother to daughter. The other which
occurs more frequently, is where heredity occurs between different
sexes--from father to daughter or from mother to son. Reversional heredity
or atavism consists in the reproduction in the descendants of the moral or
physical qualities of their ancestors. It occurs frequently between
grandfather and grandson, as well as between grandmother and
granddaughter. Collateral or indirect heredity, which is of rarer
occurrence than the foregoing, and is simply a form of atavism, subsists,
as indicated by the name, between individuals and their ancestors in the
indirect line--uncle, or grand-uncle and nephew, aunt and niece. Finally
(3) there is telegony, or the heredity of influence, very rare from the
physiological point of view, which consists in reproduction in the
children by a second marriage of some peculiarity belonging to a former
spouse.
In dealing with heredity the position of Weismann and others, that
acquired characters cannot be inherited, needs a short examination. In his
later work Weismann has practically abandoned the essential basis of his
position by admitting that maternal nutrition may play a part in
determining variation. He[68] now asserts that the origin of a variation
is equally independent of selection and amphimixis, and is due to the
constant occurrence of slight inequalities of nutrition in the germ plasm.
As acquired characters affecting the constitution of the parents are
certain to affect the nutrition of the germ plasm, it is therefore
obvious, according to Weismann's admission, that acquired characters or
their consequences will be inherited. This is an emphatic though
concealed abandonment of the central position of Weismann.
One of the stock arguments of the Weismann school is drawn from results of
the Jewish rite of circumcision. While the operation is not calculated to
make a profound impression on the constitution, and furthermore, as being
performed on the male, less likely to affect the race, still the alleged
non-inheritance of its results is much over-estimated. William Wolf,[69]
of Baltimore, Maryland, who has circumcised six hundred Jewish children,
finds on careful examination, that 2 per cent. were born partially
circumcised and 6 per cent. were born with a short prepuce. P. C.
Remondino,[70] of Los Angeles, California, has seen a large number of
cases of absence of the prepuce which proved to be hereditary. After a
confinement his attention was once called to the child by the nurse, who
thought it was deformed. The nurse was astonished at the size and
appearance of the glans penis. On examination the prepuce was found to be
completely absent. On inquiry, the father and another son, born more than
twenty years previously (comprising every male member of the family), were
found to have been born with the glands fully exposed. He has seen a
French family similarly affected.
Similar, but much stronger, results have been obtained by me through the
courtesy of the Reverend Drs. S. Bauer, M. A. Cohen, and B. Gordon, all of
Chicago. Dr. Bauer, who has been seventeen years in the practice of the
religious rite of circumcision, has circumcised 3,400 boys and has found
preputial absence in about 3-1/2 per cent. of the cases. Dr. Cohen, who
has been two decades in the practice, has performed 10,000 circumcisions.
He has found the prepuce wanting in 500 cases; partially developed in 300
cases; slightly developed in 2,000 cases. Dr. Gordon has performed 4,400
circumcisions in twenty-five years. He has found the prepuce absent in 15
cases; partly wanting in 200, and slightly developed in 2,200 cases.
These, it should be remembered, are only cases where preputial change
forced itself on the observer, who was not pursuing investigations on this
point.
The volume of Hebrew casuistic religious literature collected in the
Medrash, evidences as I have elsewhere[71] shown the frequency of
congenital preputial defect.
That acquired characters can be transmitted has been definitely shown by
the experiments of George Roe Lockwood,[72] of New York, anent hereditary
transmission of mutilations. White mice were selected, as they begin to
breed when thirty days old, and breed every thirty days. He bred in-and-in
for thirty-six generations, destroying the weakly, and thus obtained finer
animals than the first pair. He selected a pair, caged them by themselves,
and clipped the tails of the young. When they were old enough to breed, he
selected a pair and clipped the tails of their progeny. In the seventh
generation he obtained some tailless mice, and finally a tailless breed.
The experiments have one possible element of error; white mice, like all
albinoes, are a degenerate type. At the same time these experiments show
that accidental mutilations favoured by circumstances are inherited.
Eimer[73] reports the case of a pair of long-tailed pointers which had
once produced a litter of long-tailed pups. In order to obtain
short-tailed pups the owner had the tails of both shortened. The bitch
from that time produced repeatedly short-tailed pups only. As the most
careful attention was paid to the parents, no error can be suspected in
this case, which, moreover, excites no surprise among dog-breeders.
Brown-Séquard[74] has shown that a peculiar alteration of the shape of the
ear or a partial closing of the eyelids is inherited by the offspring of
animals in which these changes were caused by dividing the sympathetic.
Exophthalmia (eye protrusion) was inherited by guinea-pigs in whose
parents this protrusion of the eyes had occurred after an injury to the
spinal cord, and so were bruises and dry gangrene, as well as other
trophic disturbances in the ear, due in the parents to an injury to the
restiform body of the brain. Loss of certain phalanges or of whole toes of
the hind feet which had occurred in the parents in consequence of division
of the sciatic nerve was inherited. Diseased conditions of the sciatic
nerve occurred in the offspring of guinea-pigs in which this nerve was
divided. Forty guinea-pigs in which one or both eyes showed more or less
morbid change were descended from three individuals in which one eye had
become diseased in consequence of transverse section of the restiform
body. Twenty guinea-pigs exhibited muscular atrophy on the upper and lower
sides of the thigh, when in the parents such atrophy had been caused by
section of the sciatic nerve.
The experiments of Brown-Séquard, Westphal, Dupuy[75] and Obersteiner,
which show that artificially induced epilepsy is inherited, still further
bear out the conclusions resultant on the inheritance of these
mutilations. Indeed, Weismann has been forced to that _reductio ad
absurdum_ in science, narrowly limited definitions, in order to maintain
his position. "But although I hold it improbable," he remarks, "that
individual variability can depend on a direct action of external
influences upon the germ cells and their contained germ plasm, because, as
follows from sundry facts, the molecular structure of the germ plasm must
be very difficult to change, yet it is by no means to be implied that this
structure may not possibly be altered by influences of the same kind
continuing for a very long time. This much may be maintained: that
influences which are mostly of variable nature, tending now in one
direction, now in another, can hardly produce a change in the structure of
the germ plasm, and this is the reason why the cause of inheritable
individual differences must be sought elsewhere than in these varying
influences." "No one has doubted," he says, in reply to objections made by
Virchow, "that there are a number of congenital deformities, birth-marks,
and other individual peculiarities which are inherited. But these are
acquired characters in the above sense. True, they must once have appeared
for the first time, but we cannot say exactly from what causes; we only
know that at least a great proportion of them proceed from the germ
itself, and must therefore be due to alterations of the germinal
substance. If Virchow could show that any single one of these hereditary
deformities had its origin in the action of some external cause upon the
already formed body (soma) of the individual and not upon the germ cell,
then the inheritance of acquired characters would be proved. But this no
one has yet succeeded in proving, often as it has been maintained."
The crucial test which Weismann demands is furnished by Dupuy,[76] who
made one thousand experiments on guinea-pigs to the fifth generation,
critically rejecting all results which did not correspond to the most
rigid tests of direct heredity, excluding all instances of indirect
heredity, however demonstrable. He found that certain lesions of the
spinal cord, or the brain or the sciatic nerve, give rise in guinea-pigs
to epilepsy.
In from three to six weeks after the operation an alteration in the
nutrition takes place in an area of skin which is limited by a line
starting from the outer canthus of the eye, and running to the median line
on the upper lip, enclosing the nostril, thence backward enclosing the
lower jaw, to the anterior portion of the shoulder to the median dorsal
line, to the base of the ear and inner canthus of the eye. The alteration
in nutrition occurs on the side corresponding to the injury. The pain,
heat and cold sense disappear by degrees, while touch appears to be
exalted. Very soon, tickling this zone of skin gives rise to twitchings
limited to the muscles of the eye and the eyelids on the same side. Later,
the muscles of the mouth and of the face are affected, still later the
contractions become more general, until the whole side is the seat of
convulsions, then the convulsions attack the other side also. When things
have come to this point the convulsions precede by a very short time
complete loss of consciousness. If the subject of experiment be white, it
is found that there is paleness of the face, but in all cases there is
little foam at the mouth and dilatation of the pupils. The animal
sometimes utters a cry corresponding to the epileptic cry in the man. Not
only are the convulsions identical with those in epileptic man, but there
is also loss of consciousness, a state of torpor, stupor, and even
sometimes insanity. When epilepsy is due to the destruction of the sciatic
nerve, the foot of the affected side loses the two outer toes, so that the
animal has only one toe, the inner. When young are born to such a parent
or parents (for it matters not whether one or both of the parents have
been operated upon), they have very often only one toe on the posterior
foot. Sometimes, however, they have additional toes, which, in this case,
are attached by a pedicle to the limb.
Those peculiarities observed in the parents are in all their details
witnessed in the guinea-pigs hereditarily born toeless, who have developed
epileptic phenomena. In Dupuy's cases not only is the epileptic tendency
(of which Weismann gives a wholly imaginative microbic explanation)
inherited, but the very stigmata (loss of toes) which mark development of
the parental epilepsy.
E. D. Cope's[77] careful studies of the effects of impacts and strains on
the feet of mammals are testimony difficult for Weismann to explain, since
they also meet his requirements.
Weismann's admission of the inheritance of a tuberculous habit must
logically, from the standpoint of degeneracy, be regarded as destroying
his claims.
Kiernan has observed the case of a female cat in which brain mutilation
had been induced to secure secondary cerebro-spinal degenerations. The
mutilations were made under antiseptic precautions. The descendants of
this cat had traces of the mutilation, and its results until the fourth
generation, when the breed became extinct. This instance certainly fulfils
all Weismann requirements.
In the Lambert family a skin deformity, the last result of degeneracy in
previous generations, was transmitted. This peculiarity appeared first,
according to Proctor,[78] in the person of Edward Lambert, whose whole
body, except his face, the palms of the hands and the soles of the feet,
was covered with a horny excrescence. He was the father of six children,
all of whom as soon as they had reached the age of six weeks presented the
same peculiarity. The only one of them who lived transmitted the
peculiarity to all his sons. For five generations all the male members of
the family were distinguished by the horny excrescence which had adorned
the body of Edward Lambert.
Shwe-Maong, one of the hairless Burmese, when thirty years old had his
whole body covered with silky hairs, which attained a length of nearly
five inches on the shoulders and spine. He had four daughters, but only
one of them resembled him. She had a son who was hairy like his
grandfather. The case of this family illustrates rather curiously the
relation between the hair and teeth; for Shwe-Maong retained his milk
teeth till he was twenty (when he attained puberty); then they were
replaced by nine teeth only, five in the upper and four in the lower jaw.
Eight of these were incisors, the ninth (in the upper jaw) being a cuspid
tooth.
Certain motor expressions of disturbed functions are also inherited.
Galton describes the case of a man who, when he lay fast asleep on his
back in bed, had the curious trick of raising his right arm slowly in
front of his face, up to his forehead, and then dropping it with a jerk,
so that the wrist fell heavily on the bridge of his nose. The trick did
not occur every night, but occasionally, and was independent of any
ascertained cause. Sometimes it was repeated incessantly for an hour or
more. The gentleman's nose was prominent and its bridge often became sore
from blows which it received. At one time an awkward sore was produced
that was long in healing on account of the recurrence, night after night,
of the blows which first caused it. His wife had to remove the buttons
from the wrist of his nightgown, as it made severe scratches, and some
means were attempted of tying his arm. Many years after his death his son
married a lady who had never heard of the family incident. She, however,
observed precisely the same peculiarity in her husband; but his nose, from
not being particularly prominent, has never as yet suffered from the
blows. The trick does not occur when he is half asleep, as, for example,
when he is dozing in his armchair, but the moment he is fast asleep he is
apt to begin. It, as with his father, is intermittent, sometimes ceasing
for many nights, and sometimes almost incessant during a part of every
night. It is performed, as it was with his father, with his right hand.
One of his children, a girl, has inherited the same trick. She performs it
likewise with the right hand but in a slightly modified form; for after
raising the arm she does not allow the wrist to drop upon the bridge of
the nose, but the palm of her half-closed hand falls over and down the
nose, striking it rather rapidly, a decided improvement on the father's
and grandfather's method. The trick is intermittent in the girl's case
also, sometimes not occurring for periods of several months, but sometimes
almost incessantly. These "tricks" suggest nocturnal epilepsy, however.
The face of a child is often fully developed, yet, owing to some of the
constitutional diseases, arrested development of the face at this point
takes place. The second generation inherits this deformity, while the
grandparents possess normally developed faces.
The following case came under my own immediate observation. The
grandfather was in the habit of sitting in front of the fire with fingers
locked together twirling the thumbs in one direction, and then
occasionally knocking the thumb nails together. Two of his three sons
inherited this habit; the third brother had the habit of biting his nails
when in a fit of abstraction. The nephew of the last has a similar habit
under the like conditions. The children of this nephew have in two
instances shown a tendency to pick at the nails when in an unconscious
state, from acute disease. The third child has a periodical tendency to do
the same since it was four months old.
V. P. Gibney,[79] of New York, has reported a family consisting of father
and mother, five children, and one grandchild. The father and mother are
semi-ambidextrous. All of the children and the grandchild are
semi-ambidextrous to an annoying degree; all of the movements which they
perform with one hand are simultaneously performed by the other hand. The
girls are obliged to use only one hand when dressing themselves, or when
cutting patterns, and hold the other hand down by their side, because the
two hands perform the same movements at the same time and would interfere
with each other.
One factor in heredity concerning which there has been much dispute, and
whose existence has been denied because of certain theories anent the
nerve connection of the mother and foetus, is that of maternal
impressions. As Féré[80] has shown, the foetus exhibits very decided
reaction to sensory impressions on the mother. He cites cases of several
women who, often in the midst of an ordinary dream, producing but very
moderate excitation, not generally interrupting sleep, were awakened by
foetal movements. The dreams had nothing of the nightmare which would
cause sudden contraction under the influence of a terrifying idea. They
were merely the ordinary phenomena of sleep. Mental changes of the mother
hence excite motor reactions in the foetus, and, as with sensorial
excitations, these reactions are stronger in the foetus than in the
mother. The mechanism of these motor reactions is, Féré points out,
obviously due to unconscious and involuntary movement of the muscle walls
of the womb. The organisation of a morbid predisposition may be largely
influenced by an accident accompanying conception or gestation. In some
degenerates cannot be found a trace of hereditary defect. The fact cited
explains how sensorial excitations or repeated and violent emotions in the
mother during pregnancy give rise to profound nutritive troubles in the
foetus, and especially in its nervous system. These congenitally
degenerated beings (_ab utero_) can hardly be distinguished from those
having direct heredity. A considerable number of cases of epilepsy,
idiocy, &c., are recognised as having arisen from alcoholism in the
mother. Psychic troubles in the mother may react upon the foetus in an
analogous way. The prominent facts which show the influence of the psychic
state of the mother upon the somatic condition of the foetus explain the
action of the imagination of the mother upon the development of the
product of conception. The opinion which refers the origin of birth-marks
to intense mental impressions on the part of the mother is not without
physiological foundation. Concurrently with the motor phenomena,
stigmata[81] may become developed by vascular and nutritive troubles
produced under the influence of a strong excitation or by the imagination.
Spitzka,[82] who approached maternal impressions from an actively
sceptical standpoint, had his scepticism shaken by specimens (preserved in
the British Museum) of newly hatched chicks, all of which had a curved
beak like a parrot, and the toes set back as in that bird. According to
the report of the curator the hens in the farmyard where these
monstrosities were hatched had been frightened by a parrot which, having
escaped, fluttered among them some time before the eggs were laid and
greatly frightened those from whom the malformed chicks were received. It
is certain that the chief argument of those who deny that maternal
impressions are transmitted is defeated by this case. They have usually
asserted that the explanation of the nature and cause of a birth-mark was
always an after-thought on the part of the mother. But there was no
after-thought in this case. The hens did not publish a theory as to the
malformation of their chicks. It was their owner, a gentleman of
intelligence and culture, who observed the casual occurrence, and who
verified the almost photographic truthfulness of the germ monstrosity by
depositing it in a museum as a permanent record at which none may cavil.
Since then, the singular freaks attributable to maternal impressions of
women, seen by Spitzka, have become so numerous that he has been compelled
to negative the argument that they were merely accidental coincidences. He
has never seen an idiotic, malformed child or one afflicted with morbid
impulses derived from healthy parents free from hereditary taint in which
a maternal impression could not be traced.
In a large number a direct correspondence between the maternal impression
and the nature of the deformity or peculiarity could be discovered. He
reports the case of a woman, about five months pregnant, who, while
standing in her yard, saw her husband stab into the belly of a goat he had
slaughtered. The sight of the suddenly protruding visceral mass, which
happened to be imperfectly bilobar, shocked her extremely, and, starting
back, she, in her great revulsion, feeling a strange sensation at the nape
of the neck or back of the head, clutched the former with her right hand.
The impression continued to haunt her. When the child was born and she
saw its deformity she instantly exclaimed, "Oh, the intestines of that
goat!" At the back of its head the child had a large tumour of the
consistency of a loose sac of a bluish colour, showing convolutions
interpreted by the mother as a reproduction of the intestinal convolutions
that had so shocked her. In reality they were the convolutions of a hernia
containing the posterior ends of both cerebral hemispheres. The accidental
resemblance of the deformity to the mental impressions was striking.
A. Lagorio[83] brought before the Chicago Medical Society several cases in
which maternal impressions had produced decidedly abnormal births with
deformities resembling those feared by the mother. Kiernan, in discussing
these, pointed out that all were instances of checked development. He was
of opinion that moral shock, generally directed, played the chief part in
maternal impressions through checking development and causing either
general or local reversion. Here, as Spitzka[84] shows, the statistical
method can be applied. It has been long known that profound grief, mental
or physical shock acting on the mother, produce cerebral defect or
generally arrested development in the offspring. Of 92 children born in
Paris during the great siege, 1870-71, 64 had mental or physical anomalies
and the remaining 28 were weakly, 21 were intellectually defective
(imbecile or idiotic), and 8 showed moral or emotional insanity. These
figures, furnished by Legrand du Saulle, justify the popular designation
by the working men of Paris of the defective children born in 1871 as
"_enfants du siège_."
After the great Chicago fire in 1871 birth-marks, deformities, and mental
defects were noticed to occur among the offspring whose mothers were
pregnant with them pending the exciting time during and after the
conflagration.
Spitzka has seen in practice, constitutionally melancholic or mentally
defective children in whom no other predisposing cause could be discovered
than that the mother was struggling with direct or indirect results of the
financial crisis of 1873. In several of these cases the death of the
father was a contributory cause of maternal depression. In Berlin the
financial crisis of 1875-80 was followed by an increase in the number of
idiots born. Lombroso attributes a series of cases of microcephaly to
profound mental impressions occurring during pregnancy. To the same class
of cases belong the hermaphrodites born by mothers who have been
frightened in their first pregnancy and who continue to bear
hermaphrodites. The continual and not ill-founded dread that the
succeeding children may resemble the first is to be regarded as a
contributory cause. Observers who have had a large experience with
illegitimate births believe that the mental agony suffered by the
unfortunate mother reacts upon the foetus, causing arrest of development,
and thus accounting for the frequent occurrence of idiocy in illegitimate
children.
The influence of maternal diet on the foetus is excellently illustrated in
the results of the "fruit diet" advised by certain vegetarians. Here the
children[85] become, as Elise Berwig has recently shown, rickety,
irritable, peevish, liable to convulsions, morally peculiar, and otherwise
defective in contrast with children born of the same parents without
"fruit diet" during pregnancy.
Kiernan,[86] after citing instances reported by Amabile, Carson, F. B.
Earle, Erlenmeyer, F. H. Hubbard, C. H. Hughes, Mattison, and others, of
congenital opium habit where opium was needed to preserve the infant
during the first months of life, states that inheritance of the opium
habit seems at first an isolated phenomenon, but zoologists have pointed
out that pigeons whose ancestors were fed on poppies became intractable to
opium. Murrell found that the same was relatively true in England of
persons descended from Bedfordshire ancestors who used infusions of
poppies as a prophylactic against malaria. Nervous diseases were, however,
relatively prevalent in these districts. Narcotic habits in the ancestors
produces descendants in whom the normal checks on excessive nervous action
are removed, so that paranoiacs, periodical lunatics, epileptics,
hysterics, congenital criminals, congenital paupers, or other degenerates
result. This influence is most strongly exerted when the maternal ancestor
is the one affected, for to her is committed the development of the ovum
prior to conception and of the child subsequently. If either is interfered
with by a habit, a being defective in some respects is the result. The
direct inheritance of the opium habit has been shown experimentally by
Levenstein, who found by experiments on pregnant dogs and rabbits that the
use of opium during pregnancy produced either abortion or still-births, or
rapidly dying offspring.
In a similar manner Rennert[87] has shown that lead-poisoning occurring in
the mother is apt to produce macrocephalism with frequent idiocy in the
child.
This brings the observer face to face with the problem of morbid heredity.
It may at once be admitted that, as has been claimed by a large number of
observers, morbid heredity, especially in its graver forms, is much less
frequent than at first would be expected. J. P. Gray, of Utica, New York,
went so far as to claim that disease is never transmitted, but this is
contradicted by his own hospital reports, which, to the day of his death,
contained a table headed, "Statistics of hereditary transmission of the
disease." It is true, however, that the descendants of a victim of
morbidity or abnormality do not always exhibit the morbidity or
abnormality of the ancestor. In some cases all apparent morbidity or
abnormality is wanting. In other cases slighter abnormalities are to be
detected. Here the observer is brought face to face with the operation of
two general principles which are interdependent: the transmutation of
heredity and atavism, or "throwing back" as the cattle breeders call it.
Tennyson voices the general erroneous opinion of the always evil effects
of atavism in his "Locksley Hall Sixty Years After":--
"Evolution ever climbing after some ideal good
And Reversion ever dragging Evolution in the mud."
As Kiernan has shown, atavism at times tends to preserve the type, and
offsets the influence of degeneracy. This element of atavism underlies not
merely the production of the sound scions of degenerate stock, but also
those in whom the degeneracy affects the earlier and not the later
acquirements of the race. The contrast of the moral imbecile who is unable
to acquire an idea of right, or the idiot of the lowest grade who can
hardly be taught to keep himself clean, with the otherwise sound, sane,
able victim of hereditary gout, is very great. Yet all the links of the
chain connecting, in the same family, these contrasted types, can often be
found. The law laid down as to absolute extinction through degeneracy by
Morel and others can only be regarded as absolutely true when applied to a
given type rather than the race as a whole. Indeed, environment may play a
part in preserving a degenerate who would otherwise die out. Thus in
societies at a certain stage of culture imbeciles, paupers, lunatics, and
congenital criminals live at large and even propagate through legal
marriage. The seemingly enormous increase of the defective class which
occurs in frontier communities when the classes begin to be placed in
public institutions is an excellent illustration of this.
Manifestations of morbid heredity result not in inheritance of the whole
defect but in disturbance of relations of structure and hence of function,
producing, as Kiernan remarks, a constitutional deficiency which takes the
line of least resistance. The extent and direction of this line of least
resistance depend on the amount of healthy atavism which separate organs
and structures of the body preserve. The line of least resistance
sometimes taken is excellently illustrated in the occurrence of stigmata
already pointed out in the case of epileptic guinea-pigs.
This unilateral predisposition (which, as Kiernan has shown, is due
usually to heredity or intra-uterine causes) may be artificially
produced. Kasparek[88] cut one sciatic nerve of a guinea-pig and (after
all inflammatory symptoms had subsided) injected the opposite ear with
cultures of pus microbes. He killed the animal after some days. The sound
side was found free from suppuration, but immense abscesses existed on the
side of the cut nerve. Such local predisposition was pointed out by
Merrill[89] over forty years ago. This condition occurs, as Féré has
shown,[90] in many systemic and infectious diseases which presents a
localisation due to heredity, or determined by anterior morbid state of
the nervous symptom. Sometimes these manifestations are limited to the
side free from nervous trouble.
As a rule they attack the side which is the predominant seat of nervous
symptoms. Féré points out that in chromatic iris asymmetry the iris
(coloured part of the eye) is most coloured on the side most affected by
arrest of development. Localisation of nervous trouble occurs on the side
most affected by hare-lip. Heuse has observed the co-existence on the same
side of congenital cataract and of deformities of the skull and chest.
Hernia is often an expression of hereditary defect (Le Double) taking the
unilateral line of least resistance. Testicle inflammations of microbic
origin (venereal or otherwise) occur as a rule on the side where hernia is
located in the groin. In one-sided malformations of ovary or testicle
(decreased or increased in size, or changed in shape or location) microbe
inflammation almost always occurs at the seat of the anomaly. This
principle is illustrated in the experiments of Dupuy.[91] Here, while as a
rule, the scions of guinea-pigs (rendered epileptic by section of the
sciatic nerve) were epileptics and had deficient toes, still in some
epilepsy resulted without the toe anomaly, while still more rarely the toe
anomaly was present without the epilepsy.
The same principle is shown by certain observations of Charin and
Gley,[92] who for five years conducted experiments calculated to throw
light on the influence on the offspring of parental reception of virus.
Either both male and female have been inoculated with the bacillus of blue
pus or its toxins, or but one animal has been inoculated. The results have
not been uniform. Most frequently there ensues sterility, abortion, or
birth of progeny that die immediately. In rare instances the offspring
survive; more rarely still are they healthy. Certain rabbits (born of
these undeveloped animals) were provided with enormous epiphyses (ends of
bones), the shafts of the bones being shortened. Two rabbits were born of
a couple of which the male alone received inoculations of sterilised
culture. Five rabbits were born of these two, of which two were normal,
and a third (whose ears were rudimentary) died in a few days. In the
remaining two the ears comprised only fragments with jagged upper edges.
The tails were but two centimetres long. The external orifice of the
vagina (one rabbit was a male and the other a female) was oblique. One of
the limbs (the hind in the male and the fore in the female) was much
shorter than its fellow, the difference being four centimetres. The
shortened limb ended in a kind of stump, there being no foot or toes.
These experiments illustrate the transformation of heredity, that is the
manifestations which show the line of least resistance that the morbid
heredity has taken. As Moreau (de Tours) remarks,[93] "An incorrect
conception of the law of heredity looks for identical phenomena in each
succeeding generation. Some have refused to admit that mental faculties
were subject to heredity, because the mental characters of the descendants
were not precisely those of the progenitors. Each generation must copy the
preceding. Father and son must present the spectacle of one being, having
two births, and each time leading the same life, under the same
conditions. But it is not in the heredity of functions, or of organic or
intellectual facts that the application of the law of heredity must be
sought, but at the very fountain-head of the organism, in its inmost
constitution. A family whose head is insane or epileptic does not of
necessity consist of lunatics or epileptics, but the children may be
idiotic, paralytic, or scrofulous. What the parents transmit to the
children is not insanity, but a vicious constitution which will manifest
itself under various forms in epilepsy, hysteria, scrofula, rickets, &c.
This is what is to be understood by hereditary transmission."
The same position has been taken by Rush,[94] the pioneer American
alienist; by Maudsley,[95] by Krafft-Ebing,[96] by Meynert, by Mercier, by
Féré,[97] and others. Morel,[98] the chief accepted apostle of the
doctrine of degeneracy, remarked, nearly at the same time as Moreau, that
"heredity does not mean the very disorder of the parents transmitted to
the children with the identical mental and physical symptoms observed in
the progenitors, but means transmission of organic disposition from
parents to children. Alienists have, perhaps, more frequent occasion than
others for observing not merely this hereditary transmission, but likewise
various transformations which occur in the descendants. They are aware
that simple neuropathy (nervous tendency) of the parents may produce in
the children an organic disposition resulting in mania or melancholia,
nervous affections which in turn may produce more serious degeneracy and
terminate in the idiocy or imbecility of those who form the last link in
the chain of hereditary transmission."
What is true of the organism as a whole is true of the cells forming its
organs. It should be remembered that while cell life is altruistic or
subordinated to the life of the organ, through the law of economy of
growth, recognised by Aristotle, and through it to the life of the
organism as a whole, altruism is not complete enough to prevent entirely a
struggle for existence on the part of the cells or the individual organs.
With rise in evolution this struggle decreases, to increase with the
opposite procedure of degeneracy. From it results the phenomenon of
arrested and excessive development.
As Dareste has shown (and the fact has been corroborated by Spitzka[99]),
embryologists can imitate natural malformation of the nerve centres by
artificial methods. By wounding the embryonic and vascular areas of the
chick's germ with a cataract needle, malformations are induced, varying in
intensity and character with the earliness of the injury and its precise
extent. More delicate injuries produce less monstrous development. Partial
varnishing or irregular heating of the egg-shell, in particular, results
in anomalies comparable to microcephaly (little head) and cerebral
asymmetry. This latter fact (showing the constancy of the injurious effect
of so apparently slight an impression as the partial varnishing of a
structure not connected with the embryo at all directly) suggests the line
of research to be followed in determining the source of the maternal and
other impressions acting on the germ. What delicate problems are to be
solved in this connection may be inferred from the fact that eggs
subjected to the vibration and shocks of a railroad journey are checked in
development for several days, or permanently arrested. A more delicate
molecular shock during the maturation of the ovum, during its
fertilisation, or finally during embryonic stages of the more complex, and
therefore more readily disturbed and distorted human germ, accounts for
the disastrous effect of insanity, emotion, or other mental or physical
shock of the parent on the offspring. The cause of the majority of
cerebral deformities exists in the germ prior to the appearance of the
separate organs of the body. Artificial deformities produce analogous
results because they imitate original germ defects, either by mechanical
removal, or by some other interference with a special part of the germ.
Early involvement of the germ is shown by the fact that the somatic
malformations of the hereditary forms of insanity often involve the body
elsewhere than in the nervous axis. The stigmata of heredity--defective
development of the uro-genital system, deformities of the face and skull,
irregular development of the teeth, misshapen ears and limbs--owe their
grave significance to this fact. Like deformities of the brain, these
anomalies are also more marked and constant with the lower forms of the
hereditarily based systematised perversions of the mind than the higher.
It is easy from these results to understand how far and how the nervous
system has its part in the disorders of general development. It can be
easily understood how the individuals who present most deformities are
equally those who suffer from most decided disorders of the nervous
system.
These morbid manifestations of heredity occur in certain categories,
either local as to organs or structures, or affecting the body as a whole.
These categories Moreau (de Tours) lucidly sums up as: First, absence of
conception; second, retardation of conception; third, imperfect
conception; fourth, incomplete products (monstrosities); fifth, products
whose mental, moral, and physical constitution is imperfect; sixth,
products specially exposed to nervous disorders in order of frequency as
follows--epilepsy, imbecility or idiocy, deaf-mutism, insanity, cerebral
paralysis, and other cerebral disorders; seventh, lymphatic products;
eighth, products which die in infancy in a greater proportion than sound
infants under like conditions; ninth, products which, although they escape
the stress of infancy, are less adapted than others to resist disease and
death.
The explanation of these morbid manifestations lies in the very
foundations of embryology. Bearing in mind the principles of individuation
pointed out by Spencer, it is easily understood how reversal of this
principle would produce greater and greater destruction of the complex
functions, resultant on increased reproductive power of cells (whose
environment is not suited to such reproductions) and thus lead to such a
struggle for existence as to produce sterility (from interdestruction of
the ovum cells, or the cells forming the spermatozoon). This condition is
further increased by the operation of two biologic principles. The first
relates to the cells or organs forming an organism. The second, as Von
Baer has shown, deals with the relation of the organs to each other.
Vertebrate embryos of a common type, at their origin, assume successively
a number of common forms before definitely differentiating. Dareste points
out that supernumerary organs do exist in these common forms at one phase
of embryonic life. This community of embryonic types and this last fact
explain repetition of teratologic types or monstrosities in vertebrates.
This community of origin, moreover, indicates that a higher vertebrate
embryo contains in essence the organs and potentialities of lower
vertebrates, and that under the influence of heredity or accidental defect
an organ belonging to another species may develop, or an organ constant in
a species may be lacking in an individual, without the necessity of
explaining the immediate effects by distant atavism. Some anomalies found
among degenerates recall types less elevated than man, and very distant
from him, even his possible Lemurian precursor.
It is obvious from the principles already demonstrated that the secondary
effects of infectious disorders and injuries are reproduced in various
types in the offspring. The malformations of the limbs experimentally
demonstrated to be due to ancestral infection by Charin and Gley, and to
injury by Dupuy, noticeably occur in men. Moor has observed supernumerary
fingers in an imbecile girl; her grandfather and one uncle are
polydactylous and insane. F. S. Coolidge has had under observation a case
which excellently depicts these deformities in men. Kiernan[100] reports
the case of a man whose grandfather and father had been prophets of the
Lord, as shown by the fact that on one side of the body they had six toes
and six fingers, and the two sides of the body were unequal, the
six-fingered one being smaller than the other. This father and grandfather
were highly regarded in a secluded vale in Norway as religious teachers
and for their power to cure disease by charm. The father had ten children,
of whom three were born dead and six died in infancy. Kiernan's patient
was the only survivor of this family. During boyhood he experienced
various persecutions, some by unseen agencies, some on the part of the
villagers, who towards the end of his father's life also persecuted the
father. These persecutions seem to have been withdrawal by the peasants of
their belief in the father's ability to charm sickness out of cattle,
evidently due to growing popular intelligence. This was regarded by the
father as the result of persecution by the devil, who was desirous of
trying him as Job was tried. It was revealed to him that his son should
likewise suffer persecution, which would also be the work of the devil.
The son heard unseen persons, who pointed him out in school as the son of
the sham wizard. In consequence he was avoided by all his schoolmates
except the members of one family who still retained their belief in the
father's supernatural powers. Into this family the son married; then,
pressed by his unseen persecutors, he came to the United States. Here he
worked at his trade as a carpenter, and had no return of any persecutory
delusions, although he still believed he was a prophet. On admission to
the insane hospital, twenty years after his arrival in the United States,
he was found to have such a decidedly asymmetrical body that suspicions of
general hemiatrophy were excited, but the condition was found to be
congenital. The hand and foot of the seemingly atrophic side had six
fingers and toes. The man had been sent to the insane hospital in
consequence of an altercation with a neighbour who was clearly in the
wrong; but both being arrested, the patient's _amour propre_ was aroused
and he declared his prophetship, which led to his trial and commitment as
a lunatic. His wife, who applied for his discharge, was also a paranoiac.
They had had ten children, of whom three were still living at the ages of
six, eight, and ten. Two of these were six-toed and six-fingered
unilaterally, and one of them, a boy, had the peculiar general asymmetry
of the father. The third child was seemingly normal.
The experimental results of Charin and Gley, on the degeneration produced
in offspring by ancestral microbic infection, tend to show that not merely
are the extremities affected, but in certain cases the whole organism,
along lines laid down by Moreau's categories. This is demonstrated by
study of the degeneracy stigmata of phthisical families. Alex. James,
Ricochon,[101] C. E. Paddock,[102] and others have shown that (in addition
to the ordinary stigmata) the biologic stigmata of degeneracy (such as
plural and quickly repeated births) are frequent among phthisical
families. The same phenomena often occur in families whose scions are
attacked with diabetes, obesity, articular rheumatism, cancer and gout. De
Giovanni[103] finds that particular nervous states exist in those
predisposed to tuberculosis, whom he divides into erethists (restless),
torpids, and energetics. There is a diminutive heart, whose right
ventricle has comparatively exaggerated dimensions, while the arteries
have lessened calibre.
A family illustrating excellently the transmutation of morbid heredity is
one followed through five generations by Kiernan.[104] A farmer lived
twenty miles distant from his nearest neighbour, whose only child he
married. The daughter had led a lonely life till her courtship at the age
of 28 by the farmer, then three years younger. The farmer married her for
$300, after having impregnated her. He then found lead on his farm and
went to a city. A stock-company bought his farm and launched him into the
stock market, where he made money more as a cunning tool than an
adventurer. He became a high liver, gouty and dyspeptic, and died with
symptoms of gouty kidney at 70. The couple had five children. The eldest,
a son, became a "Napoleon of Finance," but, inheriting his father's
cunning, died wealthy and within the pale of the law. He married a society
woman, the last scion of an old family. The second child, a daughter, was
club-footed and early suffered from gouty tophi. She married a society man
of old family who had cleft palate. The third child, a daughter, had
congenital squint. She married a man who suffered from migraine of a
periodical type. The fourth child, a daughter, was normal. She married a
thirty-year-old active business man, in whom ataxia developed a year after
marriage. The fifth child, a son, was ataxic at eighteen. The children of
the "Napoleon of Finance" and the society woman were an imbecile son, a
nymphomaniac, a hysteric, a female epileptic who had a double uterus, and
a son who wrote verses and was a society man. The cleft-palated society
man and club-footed woman had triplets born dead and a squinting,
migrainous son who, left penniless by his parents, married his cousin the
nymphomaniac daughter of the "Napoleon of Finance," after being detected
in an intrigue with her. The migrainous man and squinting daughter of the
farmer stockbroker had a sexually inverted masculine daughter, a daughter
subject to periodical bleeding at the nose irrespective of menstruation,
as well as chorea during childhood, a normal daughter, a deaf-mute
phthisical son, a daughter with cloacal formation of the perineum, an
ameliac son, a cyclopian daughter (with one central eye) born dead, and,
finally, a normal son. The sexual invert married the versifier son of the
"Napoleon of Finance." The progeny of the normal daughter of the farmer
stockbroker and the ataxic husband were a dead-born, sarcomatous son, a
gouty son, twin boys paralysed in infancy, twin girls normal, a normal
son, and a son ataxic at fourteen. The progeny of the nymphomaniac
daughter and her strabismic, migrainous cousin were a ne'er-do-well, a
periodical lunatic, a dipsomaniac daughter who died of cancer of the
stomach, deformed triplets who died at birth, an epileptic imbecile son, a
hermaphrodite, a prostitute, a double monster born dead, a normal
daughter, and a paranoiac son. The ne'er-do-well married his nose-bleeding
cousin. The gouty son of the farmer's normal daughter married the hysteric
daughter of the "Napoleon of Finance." They had a son born with such
general asymmetry as to seem hemiatrophic, a prostitute, dead triplets, a
male sexual invert, a colour-blind daughter, and a normal son. The
colour-blind daughter married the paranoiac grandson of the "Napoleon of
Finance." The progeny of the sexual invert and the versifier, who were
soon divorced, were a daughter with periodical nymphomania, who had some
artistic and literary ability, and a son who died of gastric cancer. The
scions of the ne'er-do-well and his nose-bleeding cousin were a moral
imbecile, a "bleeder," a stammering daughter who had an uvular deformity,
a deaf-mute with undescended testicle, dead-born triplets, an infantile
paralytic son, and dead-born quadruplets. The progeny of the paranoiac and
his colour-blind cousin were an exophthalmic daughter, an epileptic with
undescended testicle, a cleft-palated imbecile with a cloaca, dead-born
quadruplets, an idiot boy, and a "bleeder."
Doutrebente reports the following family history: First generation: Father
intelligent, became melancholic, and died insane. Mother nervous and
emotional. Second generation: Ten children; three died in childhood, seven
reach maturity as follows: Daughter A, melancholiac; daughter B, insane at
twenty; daughter C, imbecile; daughter D, a suicide; son E, imbecile; son
F, melancholic; son G, a melancholic. Third generation: A has ten
children; five die in childhood, one is deformed, one has fits of
insanity, one is eccentric and extravagant, two are intelligent and marry,
but are childless. B leaves no issue. C has one child, a deformed
imbecile. D has three children; one is an imbecile, one dies of apoplexy
at twenty-three, and the third is an artist described as "extravagant." E
has two children; one dies insane, the other disappears and is supposed to
have committed suicide. F is childless. G has one child, who is
imbecile.[105]
Strahan[106] gives a genealogy which shows very clearly the close kinship
existing between the cancerous diathesis and other forms of constitutional
degeneration whose outward manifestations are infantile convulsions,
suicide, epilepsy, insanity, lymphatism, and sterility. The father of this
family died of stomach cancer at sixty. He had a brother who cut his
throat at fifty-six; the mother, an apparently healthy woman, died of a
fit, at the age of fifty-four. To this pair seven children were born: 1. A
son who died of stomach cancer at fifty-eight. 2. A son who died in
convulsions at thirteen weeks. 3, 4, and 5. Three daughters who died of
phthisis, one at sixteen, the other two later in life, and after being
married for many years; none left any issue. 6. A son who is epileptic,
and has twice been confined in lunatic asylums; married, but no issue. 7.
A son who is sane, and enjoying fair health. Here the taint in the mother
appears to have been slight; still, it was there, and while certainly
preventing reversion, it doubtless deepened the degeneration of the
father in the children. In the father's stock the taint was much deeper.
While it was exhibited as cancer in him, it took the form of suicidal
impulse in his brother. In the children of this pair the disease of the
father is transmitted to the eldest son; but can it be denied, Strahan
asks, that the infantile convulsions, the liability to tubercular disease,
the epilepsy, the insanity, and the marked sterility were but the varying
evidences of the degenerate nature, inherited from a father who might have
died earlier of some acute disease, taking the secret of his nature with
him?
The value of the principle of atavism in off-setting degeneracy is nowhere
better illustrated than in the history of famous families of degenerates
like those of the Binswangers, of "Margaret," of the Jukes, as well as
those reported in France, Germany, Austria, Russia, and the Scandinavian
countries. The Rougon-Macquart family of Zola (which had its actual
prototype in the Kerangal family described by Aubry[107]) had, like these,
several scions in whom former normality regained its power through
atavism. Sometimes this atavism is not shown to any greater extent than a
slight modification of the abnormality or morbidity.
Telegony, the so-called and much-debated heredity of influence, whereby
the children of a second marriage resemble the first husband, may be
explained by a biologic principle demonstrable in the lower animals,
whereby conjugation not sufficient to fecundate ova is sufficient so to
impress them that when finally fecundated they bear characteristics of
the first conjugation. Its part in either normal or degenerate heredity
is but slight. Some instances charged to it might be attributed to mental
impression on the mother.
Luys[108] excellently sums up the whole question of heredity when he
remarks: "Heredity governs all the phenomena of degeneracy with the same
results and the same energy as it controls moral and physical resemblances
in the offspring. The individual who comes into the world is not an
isolated being separated from his kindred. He is one link in a long chain
which is unrolled by time, and of which the first links are lost in the
past. He is bound to those who follow him, and to the atavic influences
which he possesses; he serves for their temporary resting-place, and he
transmits them to his descendants. If he come from a race well endowed and
well formed, he possesses the characters of organisation which his
ancestors have given him. He is ready for the combat of life, and to
pursue his way by his own virtues and energies. But inversely, if he
spring from a stock which is already marked with an hereditary blemish,
and in which the development of the nervous system is incomplete, he comes
into existence with a badly balanced organisation; and his natural
defects, existing as germs, and in a measure latent, are ready to be
developed when some accidental cause arises to start them into activity."
CHAPTER IV
CONSANGUINEOUS AND NEUROTIC INTERMARRIAGE
Byron has sung[109] of the old popular belief in the advantages of
cross-breeding, which arose originally in the practice of exogamy
(marriage outside the tribe), or, more often, outside those having the
same totem, or coat-of-arms. In all probability casual observation of
deformities after intermarriage enforced the prohibition which arose after
the killing of female children had led to exogamy. Totemic relationship
was often far from being consanguineous. The idea of incest is, as Byron's
stanza denotes, of religious origin rather than innate.[110] Its criminal
nature is often removed by priestly dispensation in Latin countries. From
this practice sprang the medical, theologic, and legal notions to which D.
H. Tuke[111] thus refers: "The danger arising from marriages of
consanguinity has been insisted upon from time to time by medical writers,
and has been recognised by ecclesiastical authority, civil law, and by
popular feeling. As regards ecclesiastical and civil law, it would be more
correct to say that the marriage of those very nearly related has been
forbidden on other grounds than that of the alleged danger to mental
health. At the same time the justice of such laws receives support if
medical observation leads to the conclusion that consanguineous marriages
tend to generate idiocy and insanity."
The biologic evidence from the experiments of Maupas on parthenogenesis,
elsewhere cited, is seemingly supported by the results of animals breeding
in-and-in. The evidence advanced against such marriages seems at first
sight exceedingly strong from a biologic standpoint in man.
Rilliet[112] cites cases tending to show that consanguineous marriages, in
themselves pernicious, tend with certainty to lower vital force. The
effects he divides into two categories; those which relate to the
parents, under which head are:--
_a._ Failure of conception.
_b._ Retardation of conception.
_c._ Imperfect conception.
Those which relate to the progeny:--
_a._ Imperfections of various kinds.
_b._ Monstrosities.
_c._ Imperfect physical and mental organisation.
_d._ Tendency to diseases of the nervous system, such as epilepsy,
imbecility, idiocy, deaf-mutism, paralysis, and various cerebral
affections.
_e._ Tendency to strumous diseases.
_f._ Tending to die young.
_g._ Tendency to succumb to disease which others would easily resist.
C. H. S. Davis,[113] of Meriden, Connecticut, states that intermarriages
in families lead to a degeneration that manifests itself in deaf-mutism,
albinism, and idiocy. Isaac Ray[114] is of the opinion that consanguineous
marriages repeated through successive generations account for the numerous
instances of insanity and idiocy occurring in quiet rural populations of
New England, far from the excitements of city life, which are generally
supposed to be more productive of mental unsoundness.
S. M. Bemiss,[115] of New Orleans, Louisiana, giving a report of the
condition of the offspring of 580 intermarriages of first cousins,
gathered mostly by medical men from nearly every State in the Union, says:
2,778 children were born of these cousins, of whom 793 were defective, 117
deaf and dumb, 63 blind, 231 idiotic, 24 insane, 44 epileptic, 189
scrofulous, 53 deformed, and 637 died early.
While these figures seem very demonstrative, they contain a great many
elements of error. One of these is incidentally pointed out by Arthur
Mitchell,[116] who finds that under favourable conditions of life the
apparent ill effects of consanguineous marriages are frequently almost
nil, whilst if the children are ill-fed, badly housed and clothed, the
evil may become very marked. He calculates that the percentage of
consanguineous marriages generally in Scotland is 1·3, or ten times less
than with the parents of idiots. Taking his figures a strong case seems to
be made out in support of the opinion that idiocy, among other evils,
results from intermarriage. Langdon Down, although his figures are not of
so unfavourable a character, admits consanguinity as one of the causes of
deterioration.
George H. Darwin concluded from a careful investigation that about 4 per
cent. of all marriages in England are between first cousins, and between 2
and 3 per cent. in the smaller towns and in the country; with these he
compared the rate of similar marriages among the parents of lunatics and
idiots in asylums, and found it to be about 3 or 4 per cent.--not higher,
therefore, than in the general population.
Huth[117] cites instances occurring regularly at the present day among
certain isolated communities (St. Kilda, Pitcairn, and Iceland) without
apparent evil consequences to the race. Such marriages were common among
the North American Indians and the South Sea Islanders, people among whom
idiocy and other degenerate hereditary conditions were remarkably rare.
These cases, Strahan remarks, deal with peculiarly healthy communities.
Therein lies the secret of such intermarriage proving innocent of evil to
the offspring. Were such intermarriage common among the degenerates the
result would be disastrous.
In 1869 the New York State Medical Society[118] appointed a committee to
investigate the influence of consanguineous marriages upon the offspring.
Their results show clearly that if the family be free from degenerate
taint, marriage among its members in no way diminishes the chances of
healthy offspring. This conclusion is in accord with the findings of
recent investigators like Anstie, George Darwin, and A. H. Huth, according
to whom there is no greater amount of morbidity or abnormality among the
offspring of consanguineous parents than among the children of parents not
so related, provided the parents be equally free from tendency to disease
or degeneration. With a perfectly healthy stock, as every breeder of
animals knows, remarks Strahan,[119] "in-and-in breeding" may be practised
with impunity, but where the stock is tainted with disease or
imperfection, safety is only to be found in "crossing."
Where the error lay in the old doctrine, upon which was founded the
prohibition of consanguineous unions, was not, as Strahan remarks, in
asserting that disease and deformity were more often met with in children
of these than in those of other unions, for such is true, but attributing
these unhappy results to the mere fact that the parents were related by
blood. Over and above the fact that these consanguineous marriages are
almost certain to transmit in an accentuated form any defect or tendency
to disease already present in the family, there is no physiological reason
why such marriages should not take place. Breeders of prize stock
frequently breed "in and in," not only with impunity, but with marked
benefit. But this fact, while going to prove that it is not the mere blood
relationship of the parents which induces the degeneration so often found
in the children of consanguineous marriages, can but rarely be advanced as
an argument in support of the marriage of blood relations. The
stock-raiser only permits the more perfect members of his flocks and herds
to continue their kind, and for this reason the "in-and-in" breeding is
innocuous, just as it would be in the human family under like conditions.
But where shall we find the perfect human family? Such families are
certainly rare. The laws of natural life have been so strained and
perverted that almost every family nowadays has a taint or twist of some
kind, and as all such imperfections are transmitted and rapidly deepened
and fixed in the family by the intermarriage of its members, it is best
that such unions should be forbidden.
Recently acquired characters, whether physiologic or pathologic, are very
liable to disappear when the individual bearing such characters
intermarries with another not having the same character. The natural
tendency in all such cases is to revert in the offspring to the normal or
healthy type, so that unless the new character be very deeply impressed
upon the parental organism it is almost certain it will not appear in the
offspring, if the other parents have nothing of the character. But when
both parents are possessed of the character, whether it be physiologic or
pathologic, this natural tendency to revert to the original is often
overborne and the character is repeated in an accentuated form in the
offspring.
Now this accentuation of all family characters is what must always happen
in the case of consanguineous marriages. If there be any taint in the
family each member of the family will have inherited more or less of it
from the common ancestor. Take the case of cousins, the descendants of a
common grandparent who was insane and of an insane stock. Here the cousins
are certain to have inherited more or less of the insane diathesis. Even
if the taint has been largely diluted in their case by the wise, or, more
likely, fortunate marriages of their blood-related parents, yet will they
have inherited a certain tendency to nervous disease, and if they marry
they must not be surprised if that taint appears in an aggravated form in
their children. Some of the children of such parents are generally
idiotic, epileptic, dumb, or lymphatic, and the parents marvel whence came
the imperfection. It may be in some cases that the parents, and possibly
the grandparent, of the unfortunate children, have not up till that time
displayed any outward evidence of the tendency to disease which they have
inherited and handed on to their descendants; and, not looking farther
back, the parents boldly assert that such a thing as insanity, epilepsy,
scrofula, &c., is unknown to their family. They themselves have never been
insane; why, then, should their children? In like manner children may be
epileptic, blind, deaf-mute, lymphatic, cancerous, criminal, drunkards, or
deformed from direct inheritance, and yet the family line be honestly
declared to be healthy. Hence the truth of Sir William Aitken's maxim,
that "a family history including less than three generations is useless
and may even be misleading." From the foregoing it is evident that the
similarity of temperament induced by a common environment, and which
Strahan would call "social consanguinity," must be a potent factor in the
production of all hereditary degenerations. Living under similar customs,
habits and surroundings, labouring at the same occupation, indulging in
the same dissipation, tend to engender like diseases and degenerations,
irrespective of any blood relationship. Hence it not seldom happens that
persons not even distantly related by blood are, in reality, much more
nearly related in temperament than cousins, or even nearer blood relations
who have experienced widely different modes of life. This "social
consanguinity" is the great curse which dogs every exclusive tribe and
class, and hurries them to extinction. It has largely aided real or family
consanguinity in the production of the diseases and degenerations which
have so heavily fallen upon the aristocracies and royal families of
Europe.
A crucial test of the opposing positions taken respectively in such a
positive manner by Bemiss and Strahan would be a family intermarrying
extensively, but placed under favouring conditions unlikely of themselves
to create degeneracy. Excellent cases of this kind are furnished by
Bourgeois[120] and Thiébault.[121] Bourgeois gives the history of his own
family, which was the issue of a union of the third degree of
consanguinity. During the ensuing 160 years there were ninety-one
marriages, of which sixteen were consanguineous. All of these latter were
productive. There was not a single case of malformation, or other physical
or mental disease in the offspring.
Thiébault reports the case of a slave-dealer who died in the year 1849 at
Whidah, Dahomey, leaving behind him four hundred disconsolate widows, and
about one hundred children. By the order of the king the whole family were
interned in a particular district, where reigned the most complete
promiscuity. In 1863 there were children of the third generation.
Thiébault, after verifying these facts, states that at that time, although
these people were born from all degrees of incestuous unions, there was
not a single instance of deaf-mutism, albinism, blindness, cretinism, or
other congenital malformation. From these cases it is evident that the
position of Strahan is not too strongly taken.
While it is true that "like clings to like," still this does not imply
kinship, but it very often implies likeness in mental characteristics.
This tendency has been shown to be present in the neurotic by Roller,[122]
De Monteyel,[123] Kiernan,[124] Bannister,[125] and Manning,[126] so far
as Germany, France, the United States, and Australia are concerned.
Bannister puts the statistical proof of this tendency very forcibly as
follows: "There are in Illinois, according to the most recent estimates,
in round numbers, about 6,000 insane, or one to a little over 500 of the
population. Even if we double, treble, or quadruple this frequency to
include all that have been or are to be insane, as well as those insane at
the present time, it would not appear that there was much probability of
two insane persons being married according to any ordinary law of chances.
In fact, we find four out of the 104 with insane heredity had both father
and mother insane. In one of these cases the insane heredity involved both
parents and both grandparents on each side, though in the case of the
latter the histories show it only as collateral. Besides these, three
patients had direct paternal and collateral maternal heredity; two had
direct maternal and collateral paternal heredity, and in one case there
was collateral heredity of insanity on both sides. This makes altogether
nearly 10 per cent. of those with insane heredity with it on both sides,
maternal and paternal, and thus favoured with a double opportunity to
inherit mental disease. If we add to this the instances where, with
insanity of one parent, there is reported either epilepsy, hysteria, or
drunkenness, 'brain disease,' nervousness, &c., of the other, the ratio of
double inheritance rises to over 20 per cent."
The beneficial effects which may result from atavism are, it will be
obvious, offset by this tendency of the neurotic to intermarry, thus
perverting the principle of atavism to the assistance of degeneracy.
The age of the parent plays a part in degeneracy. Conger[127] (whose
results have been corroborated by Joseph Workman, of Toronto, and
Kiernan,[128] of Chicago) points out that in all degenerative forms we
must take into consideration this factor, since it determines the
development of degeneracy in childhood. Hereditary taint may be
transmitted to descendants as a simple neuropathy, as a neurosis, or as a
defect of development reaching even to idiocy. Conger finds the prevailing
age, especially the age of the mothers of degenerates, is often between
twenty and twenty-five years, and that hence there exists a relation
between this age and the greater transmission of degeneracy to the
offspring. Marro, who has specially investigated the influence of the age
of the parents, both in the normal population and among criminals,[129]
finds that among all classes of criminals there is an excess of immature
parents (under 26) or senile parents (over 40), and that only petty
offenders possessed a normal number of mature parents (26 to 40 years). A
man between 20 and 25 is in as favourable condition for procreating
degenerates as the very aged. Because of incompleted organic development
he has been unable to free himself from hereditary taint which he
transmits to his descendants, but which in maturer age, through the
influence of adaptation, evolution, or education, might perhaps be more or
less notably modified.
The organism between 20 and 25 is yet incomplete; education has not been
able to exert much influence in determining those possible changes which
are adapted to modify congenital tendencies. In a word, the individual
between 20 and 25 feels too much the influence of atavic characters, and
too readily transmits to his posterity the brands of degeneracy.
Experience has made it well known that the children of the aged readily
show degenerate types. Many children of old fathers have undoubtedly
inherited all the characters of the weakness of the age in which they were
begotten. Old age represents the period of retrogression, of involution,
and hence readily transmits the mark of degeneracy. The children of either
too young or too old parents, failing to escape hereditary predisposition,
may from birth inherit those characters which are proper to incomplete
organic development or to the period of involution.
Kiernan has had under observation a Nova Scotian family of Scotch
extraction, the mother of which continued to bear children until she was
63 years old. There had been no pregnancy between 50 and 56. At 56 a son
was born who had ear, jaw and skull stigmata, and became a periodical
lunatic at 25. A son, born a year after, was a six-fingered idiot, with
retinitis pigmentosa. (These last expressions of degeneracy are, as
Darier[130] has shown, often associated. Darier's cases had the following
hereditary antecedents: One father had hemeralopia; one mother had
defective vision; a grandfather was blind at 30; a grandfather was blind
in one eye, and an uncle had congenital iris coloboma. Only one patient
examined did not have hemeralopic descendants. Six patients examined
belonged to five different families, all consisting of five or six
children, one-third of whom had hemeralopia. Among thirty-five children
there were eleven hemeralopes and two six-fingered children, who died too
young to determine the existence of retinitis pigmentosa. The disease in
all began in childhood, and hemeralopia was absent in but one case.) Three
of the next children (two boys and a girl) became paralytic idiots in
infancy. Here the degeneracy was expressed in that tendency to miliary
aneurismal weakness of arteries to which E. C. Spitzka,[131] called
attention over a decade ago. One of the next children was a periodically
sexual invert female. The last child was an epileptic. The children born
before the age of fifty were normal and averaged 60 years of age.
Matthews Duncan,[132] Arthur Mitchell, and Langdon Down, have called
attention to the influence of premature and late marriage in the
production of idiocy. Factors capable of producing idiocy are of course
capable of producing less decided expressions of degeneracy.
CHAPTER V
INTERMIXTURE OF RACES
Defoe, in his _Trueborn Englishman_, outlines a factor of great importance
in degeneracy.[133] Race intermixture is much more common than is
generally believed, owing to that ethnologic error consequent on the
discovery of Sanscrit, which tests race by speech. Keane[134] excellently
explodes this error by the following table:
Peoples. Race. Speech.
English Kelto-Teutonic Teutonic
Scotch Kelto-Teutonic Teutonic
Cornish Siluro-Kelto-Teutonic Teutonic
Irish (West) Siluro-Kelto-Teutonic Keltic
Welsh Siluro-Kelto-Teutonic Keltic
French Ibero-Kelto-Teutonic Italic
Spanish Ibero-Keltic Italic
Germans Slavo-Kelto-Teutonic Teutonic
Bohemians Kelto-Teuto-Slavonic Slavonic
Russians (many) Finno-Slavonic Slavonic
Hungarians Ugro-Slavonic Slavonic
Bulgarians Ugro-Teuto-Slavonic Finnic
Prussians (East) Letto-Teuto-Slavonic Teutonic
Rumanians Italo-Slavo-Illyric Italic
Italians Liguro-Kelto-Italic Italic
Profoundly mixed as this table indicates European races to be, it is far
from representing the full extent of race mingling. The primitive worship
of the Slavonic Czernebog by the Saxons in England demonstrates a Slavonic
strain, derivable, as Kiernan[135] remarks, from their contact with the
Wends of the Baltic. Not merely are the Aryan races of Europe mixed
together, but the blood of all has a pre-Aryan and a Turanian dash. In
Great Britain, as Taylor[136] and others have shown, the Iberian type is
found in Wales and Scotland as well as elsewhere, though in lesser degree.
These admixtures date back to palæolithic times when, although, as Keane
remarks, the predominant type of skull was dolicocephalic (or
long-headed), the brachycephalic (or round-headed type) had begun to
appear in America, then connected by land with both Africa and Europe. In
the subsequent neolithic time, while the type is at first generally
brachycephalic, it soon becomes mesatocephalic (mixed long and
round-headed), pure brachycephals and dolicocephals becoming rare. Vogt
went so far as to maintain that were the three chief anthropoid apes
developed further, two dolicocephalic and one brachycephalic type of man
would result; the first two from the chimpanzee and gorilla, the last from
the orang. The orang descendant would have long arms and red hair. The
chimpanzee descendant would be of small size, dark colour with slender
bones and jaws. The gorilla race would have massive chest, big bones,
massive jaws and teeth. These three types appear in Great Britain and
Ireland and traces of their blood are still detectable in living men. Sir
Walter Scott draws an excellent picture of the "orang" type in _Rob Roy_,
whose hero, according to reliable tradition, represented the Pict type.
Gomme[137] has lately shown that these races persisted long enough to
stamp their savage beliefs on coming races and intermingled with them. The
Neolithic race in Great Britain was dark, of feeble build, short stature,
with dolicocephalic skulls. This race remained to the historic period, as
the Silures in Great Britain and the Firbolgs in Ireland. It had high
cheek-bones and oblique eyes, as Kiernan[138] points out. Towards the
middle of the neolithic period this race was conquered by a
brachycephalic, tall, long-armed, muscular race, with florid complexion
and yellowish or red hair.[139] Scott's _Rob Roy_ is an example of this
type. A third race of fair complexion with prognathous face,
dolicocephalic skulls, of tall stature, great bones, great chest
development and massive jaws, later invaded Great Britain. While these
races resemble Vogt's hypothetical descendants of the anthropoid apes, it
should be stated that there is not the slightest evidence for this line of
descent. Writers who ignore these race characteristics have often brought
serious criticism and even discredit on the doctrine of degeneracy.
Lombroso, starting from the correct premise, that wide departure from the
race type is evidence of degeneracy, erroneously cites in illustration
Virchow's departure from the German type, Byron's departure from the
English type, O'Connell's dolicocephalic departure from the
mesatocephalic Irish type, and Robert Bruce's neanderthaloid departure
from the Scandinavian type. As Kiernan has shown,[140] Virchow, as his
name denotes, is a German-speaking Slavonic Wend; Byron was a
Celto-Scandinavian Scotchman; O'Connell was born in a district conquered
by the tall dolicocephalic race which invaded Ireland. The Bruce type of
skull is still found among the purer Norwegians, Frisians, Swedes, and
Danes, and was common just before his day and just after, as has been
shown by Taylor.
As the intermingling of races began early, the question of the existence
of pure races to-day, or even during the historic period, is an open one.
The Hebrews have been comparatively pure since the return from the
Captivity. Before that, as the history of Solomon's foreign marriages
demonstrates, they were a raceless chaos, the Semitic element
predominating. Researches by Flinders Petrie[141] and others show that the
Egyptians were a mixture of Turanians, Hamites, Aryan and Semite peoples
imposed on a negroid basis. When these elements were finally fused, the
race bred relatively true, although the lower classes tend to the negroid
type and the higher to the Caucasic.
The Koreans, as Keane remarks, are a mixture of two primitive races, one
white and one yellow. The Japanese, whose ancestors emigrated to Japan
from Korea are, according to Topinard,[142] the product of the addition of
three distinct types to that forming their Korean ancestors. The Caucasic
to a small extent, the Polynesian to a greater, and the Malay to a still
greater, are mixed with the original Korean.
The Chinese are neither a homogeneous people nor a pure race, albeit the
relatively few Mantchus are dominant. The Aryan of India, on whom Max
Müller laid such stress, is known to be, despite a rigid caste system, a
non-Aryan race, feebly infused with a modicum of Aryan blood. The
so-called "Gypsy" seems, of all the races of India, to have retained most
Aryan speech and type as well as its original semi-nomadic
waggon-journeying tendencies in the midst of settled civilisation. Ghetto
seclusion long helped to preserve relative purity of race in the Jew, but
despite vagabond surroundings the "Gypsy" has remained even purer.
Great as has been the mixture of even widely separated types like the
three races described as mingling in Great Britain and Ireland, even
greater admixture occurred in comparatively late historic times. The
so-called Scotch-Irish (whose blood enters so largely into the dominant
race of the United States) are, despite their speech (much more Teutonic
and monosyllabic than English), as Kiernan[143] has shown, a raceless
chaos of Gaelic and Cymric Celts, Lowland Scotch, French Huguenots, Danes
(Celto-Teuto-Slaves),[144] Palatinate Germans, Magyars, English Puritans,
Hollanders, Swedes, Protestant Italians, Poles, and Spaniards. The
intermixture of the dark, small-boned, dolichocephalic, orthognathous
(with in-drawn jaws) race first with the brachycephalic, prognathous,
big-boned, red-haired race, and then with the dolichocephalic prognathous,
deep-chested, big-boned, fair race, must have produced in the British
Isles as marked variations in type as now occur from the admixture of the
Indian and negro. These are especially noticeable in the Marshpee Indians
of Cape Cod, the Long Island tribes and the "Red Bones" of South Carolina.
The Marshpee tribe is an admixture of Anglo-Saxon, Portuguese, Indian, and
negro. The Indian element, while still demonstrable, is lessening. Some of
the older people still retain Indian characteristics. A girl of ten was
negro in all respects except her hair. An adult whose mother was half
white, half Marshpee, while the father is negro, had all the negro
characteristics except the skin, which was Indian in type, and the jaws,
which were slender. Another adult who had a negro great-grandfather,
Marshpee mother, and a three-fourths Marshpee father, had large,
negro-like jaws, Indian hair, skin, and cheek-bones. Another adult had a
Portuguese maternal grandmother, negro grandfather, an Indian-white
paternal grandmother and Indian-negro paternal grandfather. His hair,
jaws, and nose were negro, his cheek-bones were high, his upper and lower
jaws met so that the front teeth occluded.[145] The like condition obtains
in the Long Island Indians, but to a less extent with the "Red Bones,"
who, after the type was formed, avoided admixture with the negro.
The influence of race intermixture in the production of degeneracy is
easily settled. Basing their opinion on the notorious sterility of the
hybrid offspring of the horse and ass, certain biologists have assumed
like results in man and have cited the alleged absence of Australian
half-breeds in evidence. Since the hare and rabbit, dog and wolf, sheep
and goat produce breeds intermediate between the parents, fertile while
environment is unchanged, horse and ass sterility cannot be accepted as of
much value in settling the question. Recent researches have shown that the
half-breeds which survived birth among the Australians were killed in
accordance with tribal usages regulating population in accordance with
food supply.
Whether the results of race intermixture prove degenerate or not will turn
largely on the environment. The mulatto is certainly better adapted to the
white environment than the pure negro, albeit less so than the white. That
race intermixture may, however, determine degeneration, is shown by the
relapse into voodooism and cannibalism of the Haiti and Louisiana French
hybrids, and the Anglo-Saxon hybrids of Liberia, who contrast
disadvantageously with the Arabianised Moslem Mandingoes and Veys, which
last have advanced so far as to devise a system of writing. The extent of
the influence of environment is shown in the career of the Dumas family,
which is of Haitian-negro origin. The grandfather was a general in the
French army, the father and son were two stars in the literary firmament.
The sculptor, Edmonia Lewis, was of similar stock to these. Evidences of
degeneracy were rare among the Marshpee Indians, as I have elsewhere
shown.[146]
The Abyssinians have preserved that antique type of Christianity which had
Jewish usages; they had their own literature, alphabet, and old type of
civilisation. According to Keane, the present inhabitants of Abyssinia
form an extremely complex ethnical group in which it is not always
possible to distinguish the constituent elements. The prevailing colour
is a distinct brown, shading northwards to a light, olive, fair
complexion, southwards to a deep chocolate and an almost sooty black.
There are Abyssinians who may certainly be called black, and in whom the
negro strain is revealed in the somewhat tumid lip, small nose, broad at
base, and frizzly, black hair. But the majority may be described as a
mixed Hamito-Semitic people, who, beyond question, belong fundamentally to
the Caucasic division. While the Hamitic, Semitic, and the Latin branch of
the Aryans are admitted to form a fertile, progressive admixture with the
negro, the reverse is commonly assumed to be the case with the English
speaking Celto-Teutons. Daniel Wilson[147] is of opinion that this is not
true as to millions of the coloured race who now constitute the indigenous
population of the Southern States. They are at home there in a climate to
which the white race adapts itself with very partial success. The
offspring of white fathers and of mothers of the African races, they have
multiplied to millions; and now, with the recently acquired rights of
citizenship, and with the advantage of education within their reach, the
country is their town. The very social prejudices against miscegenation
protect them from the effacing influence to which the Indian half-breed is
exposed, by ever-recurrent intermarriage with the dominant race. As yet
there are discernible the various degrees of heredity from the mulatto to
the quinteron. But the abolition of slavery has placed the coloured race
on an entirely new footing. Left as it now is, free to enjoy the
healthful, social relations of a civilised community, and protected, by
the very prejudices of race and caste, from any large intermixture with
the white race, it can scarcely admit of doubt that there will survive on
the American Continent a Melanochroi of its own, more distinctly separated
from the white race, not only by heredity but also by climate influences,
than the "dark Whites" of Europe are from the blonde types of Hellenic,
Slavic, Teutonic, or Scandinavian stock. This condition will be modified
by the fact that the negro American, like the others, is a traveller and,
with a rise of culture, tends to city life.
The admixture with the white has reduced negro prognathism and
dolichocephaly. It must, however, be admitted that these reductions had
already been begun in Africa. Sir H. H. Johnston, however, fully agrees
with the negro writer[148] who holds that the "pure and unadulterated
Negro cannot, as a rule, advance with any certainty of stability above his
present level of culture; that he requires the admixture of a superior
type of man." But the white and black races are "too widely separated in
type to produce a satisfactory hybrid"; hence Johnston thinks that, "the
admixture of yellow that the Negro requires should come from India, and
that Western Africa and British Central Africa should become the America
of the Hindu. The mixture of the two races would give the Indian the
physical development which he lacks, and he, in his turn, would transmit
to his half Negro offspring the industry, ambition, and aspiration toward
a civilised life which the Negro so markedly lacks."
On the whole, race intermixture will not tend to elevate the race where
there is a decided difference in the state of evolution of the two races,
and moreover especially where, as is usually the case, the mother is of
the inferior race. It must be obvious that, given a negro pelvis and the
head of a white, results damaging to the offspring cannot but occur. And
these results are of a nature likely to be transmitted by heredity. The
same would hold true with other races as well. Although the differences
between the Hawaiian and the white are much less than those between the
negro and the white, it is notorious that while the labours with pure
Hawaiians are easy, those with half-whites are difficult. The same
conditions have been observed from time to time between different breeds
of dogs, whose pelves vary. Therefore it is safe to assume that admixtures
of races of different grades of evolution will, if carried to any great
extent, tend to render the superior race more liable to the action of the
factors producing degeneracy. Dixon[149] has shown that mulatto families
tend to disappear, if they be not crossed with either black or white, and
that the limit of descent is the fourth generation. He has also pointed
out that morbid proclivities and retrogressive tendencies are peculiarly
rife among mulattoes. The fact, long ago shown by Menatta,[150] that the
conflict for existence between brain growth and reproductive organ growth
at puberty, results, in the mulatto, as in the negro and anthropoids, in
the triumph of the reproductive, indicates that the mulatto has factors of
degeneracy which would be fatal to the establishment of an intermediate
type on the environment of the white. While Menatta is in error in
regarding skull mal-development as the cause, when it and brain growth
disturbance are defects due to the same cause, still general observation
supports his opinion that "negro children are sharp, intelligent, and full
of vivacity, but on approaching the adult period a gradual change sets in.
The intellect seems to become clouded, animation giving place to a sort of
lethargy, briskness yielding to indolence. We must necessarily infer that
the development of the negro and white proceeds on different lines. While
with the latter the volume of brain grows with the expansion of the brain
pan, in the former the growth of the brain is, on the contrary, arrested
by the premature closing of the cranial sutures and laternal pressure of
the frontal bone." Since, as Havelock Ellis remarks,[151] even the highest
races do not fulfil the promise of evolution they make before puberty,
anything which tends still further to impede the fulfilment must be
regarded as a factor of degeneracy. Hence intermixture with an inferior
race, having an inferior type of pelvis, would tend to degeneracy.
CHAPTER VI
TOXIC AGENTS
The toxic agents which influence the race toward degeneracy, exert that
deterioration in a mode which closely resembles that of the degenerative
powers of the acute and chronic contagions and infections. The acute
poisonings by these toxic agencies resemble the acute, nervous and other
exhaustion caused by the toxin of the germs underlying the infections and
contagions. The chronic conditions due to these toxic agents agree in many
respects with the chronic states produced by the infections and
contagions. The toxic agencies are divisible into those belonging to the
condiments, medicines, foods and beverages, and those arising from
occupations.
Tobacco is the most common, while alcohol and opium contend for second
place both as to use and as to deleterious effects. Alcohol has been
repeatedly charged with being _the_ factor in degeneracy. Statistics of
the first half of the present century seem to justify the conclusion that
it is apparently the most potent factor, yet these statistics as a rule
confound coincidence and cause, or effect and cause, or the vicious
circles thereby resulting, to a remarkable degree. There are but few
races in which alcohol has not been used and abused. The American
Indians[152] had tizwein, chica, and pulque long ere Columbus; the Tartars
and Russians, bouza, kvas, and kumyss; the South Sea Islanders ava and
toddy (from the cocoanut); the Tunisians, laymi. The vast majority of the
races of mankind have used alcoholic beverages. Each was called by a local
name and not by a loan word, a most demonstrable evidence of local origin.
Even the social insects (bees and ants) at times indulge in fruit
ferments. The claim, therefore, that alcohol is the product of high
civilisation, hence of recent origin, and hence peculiarly destructive, is
untenable. That excess in alcohol frequently occurs in degenerate stocks
is, however, undeniable. But as Krafft-Ebing, Kiernan, Spitzka and others
have shown, intolerance of alcohol is an expression of degeneracy. The
person intolerant of alcohol becomes either a total abstainer because of a
personal idiosyncrasy (like that which forbids certain people to eat
shell-fish lest nettle-rash occur), or because of parsimony, or for both
reasons combined. Such total abstainers leave degenerate offspring in
which degeneracy assumes the type of excess in alcohol as well as even
lower phases. The race tests of the deteriorating influence of alcohol are
practically valueless, nor are statistics concerning alcoholism in the
ancestry of degenerates of much more use. The enormous amount of idiocy,
for example, in the Scandinavian countries, charged by Huss, Langdon Down
and others to alcoholism in the parents, has been, by the most recent
researches, cut down by Roof to less than 7 per cent. Insane hospital
statistics vary to a like degree. Bad faith, however, is out of the
question in these statistics. Lack of analytic skill, and that dangerous
unscientific, canting, philanthropic tendency which rebels at statistics
unfavourable to preconceived sociologic theories, explain these
discrepancies. The ignoring of all but the alcoholic factor produces also
great elements of error. Kiernan[153] cites twenty-three cases in which
degenerate stocks were charged to alcoholic parentage, but which on
analysis proved to be due to a degenerative factor in the parents of which
alcoholism was merely an expression. Nearly all the offspring born after
inebriety were prematurely born, defective, epileptic, hysteric, insane,
idiots or criminals. Some few were healthy, apart from their intolerance
of alcohol. In eighteen cases both father and mother were alcoholists. The
fathers in four of these cases had been temperate, industrious, and
affectionate ere being sunstruck. Following this came periods of
irritability, excessive drinking and spendthriftiness. The mothers had
remained for some years after the fathers' breakdown free from the use of
alcohol, but were nervously exhausted from the strain. One became
depressed during pregnancy, was given gin for the depression, and the
habit persisted after the delivery. In the three other cases painful
menses developed during the nervous exhaustion. The popular prescription
for these, gin, was given, with the result of producing inebriety. In ten
cases skull injury to the father had like results on both mother and
father. In two cases the mother became a victim of painful menstruation
after a railroad accident; gin drinking, to relieve this, followed and
became a habit. The father's nervous system broke down under the strain
and both became inebriates. In two other cases nervous exhaustion from
typhoid and typhus fever produced the same outcome in inebriety on the
part of the father and mother. In the remaining cases the inebriety was an
expression of nerve exhaustion after various protracted infections. The
alcoholism in these cases was clearly an expression of the factors of race
deterioration producing degeneracy, and not its cause.
The influence of alcohol must therefore first be studied on the individual
to determine its value and method of action as a cause of race
deterioration. Careful medical researches have shown that alcohol produces
a nervous state, closely resembling that induced by the contagions and
infections, often accompanied with mental disturbance (delirium tremens
and acute types of insanity). The acute nervous state to which the term
alcoholism was applied by Magnus Huss has all the essential
characteristics of the nervous state due to the contagions and infections.
There is, however, a greater tendency to impotence and sterility in the
alcohol nervous state than in the others, and consequently a lesser
influence on race deterioration. The condition, moreover, has a tendency
to set into action degenerative tendencies latent in the liver and
kidneys. This action of alcohol on the liver and kidneys so interferes
with their functions as to produce the effect already described as
resulting in the contagions and infections from their toxins. Alcohol
exerts a similarly deteriorating influence on the antitoxin-forming
organs (especially on the testicles, ovaries and their appendages), to
that already described as exerted by the toxins of the contagions and
infections. To the direct toxic effects of alcohol are therefore added
results of imperfect liver and kidney action and defective strengthening
powers from deficient antitoxin secretion. Like all toxic agents, alcohol
interferes with the functions of the eye and ear nerves. Special weakness
thus created is transmissible to the offspring. The chronic type of
alcoholism may well be compared in its effect with chronic contagions.
There is, however, less tendency to infection with the microbes forming
pus. There is a greater tendency to deteriorating action on the nervous
system. There is in chronic alcoholism, as in syphilis, special tendency
to that formation of connective tissue which destroys organs. The chronic
mental disorders of chronic alcoholism resemble those of tuberculosis
except that the capricious state and exaltation are less frequent than the
suspicional tendency which is deeper, and takes the direction of delusions
of poisoning and insane jealousy. The last are due to the deteriorating
influence of alcohol on the generative organs. Alcohol may limit its
action to the central nervous system, and thus produce hereditary losses
of power. It causes changes in the peripheral nerves which in the
offspring find expression in spinal cord and brain disorder through
extension of the morbid process. But for its deteriorating effects on the
ovaries and testicles, alcohol would be a most serious social danger.
Through its action on the generative organs it tends to prevent the
survival of the unfit, rather than to develop degenerates.
Opium seems to be the Charybdis on which the human bark strikes when
escaping from the Scylla of alcohol. Its abuse as a narcotic is much
older, even among the English-speaking races, than is generally suspected.
Murrell, over ten years ago, demonstrated that the inhabitants of the fens
of Lincolnshire had long employed opium as a prophylactic against malaria.
The ratio of insanity in these regions proved to be very great. The same
conditions obtained in certain malarial regions of New Jersey and
Pennsylvania, where the use of strong infusions of poppy was common. The
statistics of Rush[154] as to opium-caused insanity in Pennsylvania,
indicate that the percentage of American opium abuses at the beginning of
the nineteenth century was very great. The drug differs in two serious
respects from alcohol. It is nearer in chemical composition to nerve
tissue, and the tendency to its use may be transmitted by the mother
directly to the foetus. This, as Bureau and Ringer have shown, receives
through the placenta from its opium-using mother a certain amount of
morphine. In consequence, the child in the first month of infancy must be
nourished on the milk of an opium-using woman, or given opium in some
other way lest it perish. To this fact Calkins[155] was the first to call
attention. His results were corroborated later by Hubbard; Kiernan, of
Chicago[156]; Erlenmeyer, of Berlin; F. B. Earle, of Chicago; Mattison, of
Brooklyn; Hughes, of St. Louis; and others. Amabile, of New York, showed
that not only were the children of opium-using mothers born with tendency
to the opium habit, but that the mothers aborted frequently with twins,
and that the children who survived were very liable to convulsions.
Independently of this factor the mental state produced by opium habit
resembles in many respects that of the lunatic, in that the victim of
opium is as unable to distinguish between his wishes and the facts, and
therefore often utters what appear to be sheer lies. Hence he is totally
unreliable and has taken a step in mental and moral degeneracy that, by
the ordinary laws of heredity, must greatly increase, unless corrected by
healthy atavism and training in the next generation. Opium is a more
dangerous factor of degeneracy than alcohol, since the opium user must be
in a continuous state of intoxication to carry on his usual avocation,
while abstinence is perfectly compatible with proper work on the part of
the drunkard. The opium habit is increased by the peculiar propaganda
carried on by the _habitués_ who justify their position by urging the use
of opium for any ailment, however minimal. Opium, like alcohol, causes
nervous exhaustion similar to, but greater than, that of the contagions
and infections. From the affinity of opium to nerve tissue, from its
tendency to stimulate the heart, thus causing increased blood supply to
the brain; from its action on the bowels and the increased resultant work
of the liver, this nervous state is much intensified. Opium does not have
as great tendencies to interfere with the structure of the ovary and
testicles as alcohol, hence the greater danger of the opium _habitué's_
children surviving. Opium, when smoked, stimulates the reproductive
apparatus, and thus would greatly increase the number of degenerates due
to this habit but for the defects due to the inheritance of the habit and
their consequences.
[Illustration: FIG. 1.--ANTE-CHRISTIAN IRISH PIPES.]
[Illustration: FIG. 2.--ANTE-COLUMBIAN PIPES FROM SCULPTURE AT
STRATFORD-UPON-AVON.]
The origin of the use of tobacco is usually ascribed to the New World.
There is no doubt that immediately subsequent to the discovery of America,
the use of tobacco spread over the world, and that its employment by Sir
Walter Raleigh made it fashionable. It is certain, however, that the
Romans and Irish employed pipes for smoking long ere the Christian era
(Fig. 1), but the substances smoked were not tobacco but dried aromatic
leaves. The English before Columbus (Fig. 2) did the same. In Western Asia
historic botanical evidence leaves no doubt that tobacco was indigenous.
Tobacco from the East hence probably encountered tobacco from the West,
both currents meeting in Asia Minor. As with alcohol and opium the
statistic method generally adopted proves fallacious when applied to the
degenerative effects of tobacco. Study of its effects on the individual is
needed to determine its effects on the race. The most careful researches
show that the typical effects occur as a rule after long-continued use of
tobacco, sometimes not until twenty years or more. While many smokers
reach old age, many fail to live to old age because they are smokers. The
skin is the subject of itching and reddening, the nerves of taste are
blunted, and patches develop in the throat; loss of appetite, epigastric
fulness, pain, vomiting, and disturbance of bowel function are common.
Menstrual disturbance occurs in women. In female cigar-makers abortion and
pluriparity are frequent. The sexual appetite is impaired and sometimes
sterility and impotence occur; also disturbed heart action, palpitation,
rapid and intermitting pulse, precordial anxiety, weakness, faintness and
collapse, with sclerosis of the coronary arteries of the heart and left
ventricular hypertrophy. Cigars and cigarettes produce irritation of the
nose, mucous membrane, diminished smell, chronic hyperæmia of the
epiglottis and larynx, and sometimes of the trachea and bronchi
predisposing to consumption. Nicotine amblyopia, or sight weakness, is
common, with central disturbances of the field of vision and with
colour-weakness of sight. Often there is disorder of the ear tubes and
congestion of drum, with loss of power of the hearing nerves, and
consequent noises in the ear. The central nervous system is affected. In
high schools, non-smokers get on better than smokers. Children from 9 to
15 years of age exhibit less intelligence, laziness, or other degenerative
tendencies. Adults have head-pressure, sleeplessness, or drowsy stupor,
depression, apathy, and dizziness. There may also be ataxic symptoms,
paretic weakness of bowel and bladder, trembling and spasms. Tobacco
insanities are comparatively rare in smokers, but are common in snuffers
and still oftener in chewers.[157] In the precursory stage, which lasts
about three months, there is general uneasiness, restlessness, anxiety,
sleeplessness, and mental depression, often of a religious type. After
this occurs precordial anxiety, and finally the psychosis proper
consisting of three stages: 1. Hallucinations of all senses, suicidal
tendency, depression of spirits, attacks of fright with tendency to
violence and sleeplessness. 2. Exhilaration, slight emotional exaltation,
agreeable hallucinations after from two to four weeks' relaxation, again
followed by excitement. 3. The intervals between exaltation and depression
diminish, the patient becomes irritable, but otherwise not alive to his
surroundings, and perception and attention are lessened. The patient may
be cured in five or six months if he stop tobacco during the first stage.
In a year or so he may recover during the second stage. After the third
stage the disease is frequently incurable. As the patient often becomes
(especially by the use of the cigarette) an _habitué_ ere puberty, the
proper development and balance of the sexual and intellectual system is
checked. These patients break down mentally and physically between 14 and
25. The moral delinquencies, other than sexual, are often an especial
tendency to forgery and deceit of parents. Frequently the insanity of
puberty (hebephrenia) is precipitated by tobacco. The cigarette, if used
moderately, may be a sedative, but as used is a stimulant, and is often
made of spoiled tobacco, resembling in reaction morphine, and on animals
acting in a somewhat similar manner. As tobacco turns the salivary glands
(which are concerned in digestion of starch) into excretory glands, it
leads to imperfect digestion of starch, to consequent irregular
fermentation in the bowel, thus at once furnishing a culture medium for
microbes, to form more violent toxins from, and also creating leucomaines,
to interfere especially with a nervous system overstimulated by nicotine.
This is one great reason why those who snuff and chew tobacco more
frequently become insane from tobacco than smokers, albeit these last are
not exempt.
Statistics from the female employés of the Spanish, French, Cuban, and
American tobacco factories, while defective and somewhat vitiated by the
co-existence of other conditions producing degeneracy, support the opinion
that the maternal tobacco habit (whether intentional or the result of an
atmosphere consequent on occupation) is the cause of frequent
miscarriage, of high infantile mortality, of defective children, and of
infantile convulsions.[158]
Tobacco, therefore, in its influence on the paternal and maternal
organism, exhausts the nervous system so that an acquired neurosis results
in such a way as to be transmissible.
Professional tea-tasters have long been known to suffer from nervous
symptoms; very early in the practice of their occupation the head pressure
symptoms of neurasthenia occur. Tremor also occurs early. While changes in
the optic nerve have not been demonstrated beyond a doubt, still eye
disorders have been observed in the pauper tea-drinkers of the United
States and in the tea-tasters of Russia, thus indicating that similar
changes to those produced by tobacco and alcohol are likely to occur in
the optic nerve from tea. Bullard[159] has found that tea has a cumulative
effect. In his experience toxic effects are not produced by less than five
cups daily. The symptoms manifested are those of nervous excitement
resembling hysteria, at times almost amounting to fury; nervous dyspepsia;
rapid and irregular heart action; neuralgia of the heart; helmet-like
sensation on the head, and tenderness along the spine. James Wood,[160] of
Brooklyn, found that 10 per cent. of those under treatment at the city
hospitals exhibited similar symptoms. Of these 69 per cent. were females.
Every symptom ascribed by Bullard to tea was found by Wood in his cases,
who also found that the women manifested irregularities in menstruation
of neurasthenic or hysteria type. He has found these symptoms to be
produced by one-half of the quantity of tea charged with these effects by
Bullard. The _Lancet_[161] several years ago, from an editorial analysis
of the effects of tea-tippling, took the position that in no small degree
nervous symptoms occurring in children during infancy were due to the
practice of the mothers, both of the working and society class, indulging
in the excessive use of tea, the excess being judged by its effects on the
individual and not by the amount taken. Convulsions and resultant
infantile paralysis were frequently noticed among the children of these
tea-tipplers. Observations among the factory population and the workers in
the clothing sweating-shops show that tea neurasthenia, presenting all the
ordinary symptoms of nervous exhaustion, is especially common among these.
It is evident that tea produces a grave form of neurasthenia readily
transmissible to descendants. In addition to its effects directly upon the
nervous system, tea tends to check both stomach and bowel digestion, and
thus increases the self-poisoning which is so prominent a cause,
consequence, and aggravation of these nervous conditions.
Coffee exerts a very similar action to that of tea, albeit the nervous
symptoms produced by it are usually secondary to the disturbances of the
stomach and bowel digestion. Coffee produces tremor, insomnia, nervous
dyspepsia, and helmet sensations. With the exception of certain districts
of the United States, coffee abuse is not carried to such an extent as
tea, albeit in these, as in some portions of Germany, the habit is an
excessive one. The conditions described result in Germany as frequently
as they do in the United States. Mendel[162] finds that in Germany coffee
inebriety is increasing and supplanting alcohol. Profound depression with
sleeplessness and frequent vertex headache are early symptoms. Strong
coffee will remove these temporarily, but it soon loses its effects, and
they recur. There is much tremor, especially of the hands. The heart's
action is rapid and irregular. Nervous dyspepsia is frequent. L. Bremer,
of St. Louis, Mo., has observed similar conditions among both Germans and
Americans there.
While coca took its place only recently among the toxic causes of
degeneracy, it was old as a factor in the degeneration of the Peruvian
long ere the discovery of America by Columbus. Forty-three years ago
Johnston[163] wrote that even Europeans in different parts of Peru had
fallen into the coca habit long practised by the Indians. A confirmed
chewer of coca is called a _coquero_, and he becomes more thoroughly a
slave to the leaf than the inveterate drunkard is to alcohol. Sometimes
the _coquero_ is overtaken by an irresistible craving, and betakes himself
for days together to the woods, and there indulges unrestrainedly in coca.
Young men of the best families of Peru are considered incurable when
addicted to this extreme degree of excess. They abandon white society, and
live in the woods or in Indian villages. In Peru the term white _coquero_
has the same sense as irreclaimable drunken tramp. The inveterate
_coquero_ has an unsteady gait, yellow skin, quivering lips, hesitant
speech, and general apathy. The drug has assumed an unusual prominence in
the field of degeneracy since the discovery of its alkaloid, cocaine.
Since then there has sprung into existence in both Europe and the
English-speaking countries the world over, a habit which, while much
over-estimated, is undoubtedly growing, and aggravating as well as
producing degeneracy. Many of the cases reported as due to cocaine are,
however, chargeable to the desire of the hysteric or neurasthenic to
secure a new sensation, or the desire on the part of the opium or whisky
_habitué_ to try a dodge for forgiveness by friends. The habit is very
frequently induced by patent medicines taken to cure catarrh by the
neurasthenic, or to cure nervousness by hysterics as well. As the
deformities of the nose passages predispose to what is called "catarrh,"
patent medicines for local application containing cocaine are frequently
employed in the treatment of this supposed constitutional disease, with
the result of aggravating the original degeneracy. As the youth under the
stress of puberty frequently ascribes all his ills to catarrh, he also
employs very frequently snuffs containing cocaine, and has his nervous
condition much aggravated thereby. Among the nostrums urged in the
newspapers and magazines for this condition, so often resultant on nerve
stress, is a certain notorious snuff containing 3 per cent. of cocaine.
From the description given by Johnson of the _coquero_ there can be no
doubt but tramps, errabund lunatics, and paupers result from this habit,
to give birth to degenerates in the next generation.
Lead has been found to produce in those exposed to its fumes a systemic
nervous exhaustion, characterised by local paralysis about the wrist as
well as the general symptoms of profound systemic nerve tire. This may
result, as Tanquerel des Planches[164] pointed out nearly half a century
ago, in acute insanity of the confusional type followed very often by
forms of mental disorder of a chronic type resembling paretic dementia. In
some cases the patient recovers from the acute insanity to suffer
thereafter from epilepsy. In other cases, as Kiernan has shown,[165] an
irritable suspicional condition results, in which the patient may live for
years, marry, and leave offspring. This last condition and the epileptic
are the most dangerous as to the production of degeneracy. As has already
been pointed out, the women employed in the pottery factories in Germany
suffer according to Rennert[166] from a form of lead poisoning which
produces decidedly degenerative effects upon the offspring. These women
had frequent abortions, often produced deaf-mutes, and very frequently
macrocephalic children.
Brass workers suffer from a very similar nervous condition to that
produced by lead. Hogden,[167] of Birmingham, called attention to the
grave forms of nervous exhaustion produced among brass-workers. The period
during which the patient is able to pursue the occupation without breaking
down is longer than that of the lead workers. Women, like men, are exposed
to this condition. The chief effect produced, so far as offspring have
been observed, is chiefly frequent abortions and infantile paralysis.
The occupations employing mercury, whether mining, mirror-making, or
gilding, produce forms of systemic nervous exhaustion in which the most
marked symptom (but less important from a sanitary standpoint) is a tremor
amounting at times almost to shaking-palsy. Like all other systemic
nervous exhaustions, the mercurial one may appear as degeneracy in the
offspring. The employment of women in match factories and tenement house
sweating shops is growing. The chief toxic effect of phosphorus is not the
localised jaw necrosis. This is but an evidence of the progressive system
saturation with phosphorus. It bears the same relation to the more
dangerous effects of phosphorus that "blue gum" does to the systemic
effects of lead.
Every condition arising from a toxic cause capable of producing profound
systemic nervous exhaustion in the ancestor, and especially the
ancestress, is likely to be transmitted as degeneracy to the descendant.
Undoubtedly with the growing tendency of woman to pass from the ill-paid
work of the seamstress to the better paid but dangerous occupations, a
certain seeming increase in degeneracy must result.
CHAPTER VII
CONTAGIOUS AND INFECTIOUS DISEASE
Among the gains of human advance in evolution stand out prominently
complete immunity from certain diseases due to germs, and partial immunity
from others, which last immunity results in chronic types, rather than in
acute, because of increased vital resistance in man. Tuberculosis and
dourine, acute diseases in the cow and horse, have become chronic
diseases, tuberculosis (or consumption) and syphilis, in man. Such
chronicity is evidence of advance, yet it constitutes an element of
degeneracy, since the victim of the chronic disease is able to leave more
offspring than would be possible were the disorder acute. In other
respects acute and chronic contagions and infections exert the same
influence in regard to degeneracy. The germ of the disease may be
inherited, or general nutrition of the foetus may be so checked in
development that the child inherits a predisposition to disease.
Through this check to foetal development the phagocytes, or white blood
cells, become so weakened that they are unable to devour foetal structures
as useless to man as the tadpole's tail (which it devours) is useless to
the developed frog. This power being weakened, the organs which form
antitoxins (or protective tonics against disease), from lack of
development fail to perform their function. For this reason in the
degenerate many infections and contagions assume their old destructive
type.
The influence of these disorders in the parent may result in the bony
mal-development shown to occur in animals by Charrin and Gley, and in man
by Coolidge. The facial bones, jaw, and teeth are peculiarly liable to be
thus affected. Though the effect of the disease on the parent be but
temporary, the child's development may be checked as to higher tendencies.
Thus mothers have borne moral imbeciles, epileptics or lunatics, after a
pregnancy during which they were attacked by contagious disease, albeit
the children of subsequent and previous pregnancies were normal.
The children of pregnancies previous to the one complicated by the
contagious disease may be healthy, while those of subsequent pregnancies
are defective. Any contagious or infectious disease may not only interfere
temporarily with the bodily strength, but may produce complete change in
the parent's system extending even to the highest acquirement of man. In
some occur changes thus graphically described by Bulwer: "There have been
men who, after an illness in which life itself seemed suspended, have
arisen as out of a sleep with characters wholly changed. Before gentle,
good, and truthful, they now become bitter, malignant, and false. To those
whom they before loved they evince repugnance and loathing. Sometimes this
change is so marked and irrational that their kindred ascribe it to
madness. Not the madness which affects them in the ordinary business of
life, but that which turns into harshness and discord the moral harmony
which results from natures whole and complete."
The nerve centres controlling nutrition, growth, repair, secretion, and
excretion are often as deeply affected as those checks constituting
morality. At the periods of physiologic stress these effects are
especially noticeable. Moral insanity, intellectual insanity, unequal
mental balance, hysteria, precocious sexuality, unconscious mendacity,
mental parasitism (the germ of pauperism), epilepsy, neuroses, and all
types of nutritive and constitutional defects result. The nutritional
defects may appear chiefly in the walls of the blood vessels and
lymphatics. While these are most common in the chronic infections and
contagions, they often occur in acute typhoid fever, scarlatina,
diphtheria, whooping-cough, &c. Proper blood supply and utilisation of
waste is thus prevented. Organs cannot perform their function, and are
predisposed to disease from disuse and from weakness of the
disease-fighting phagocytes and antitoxins. From this results irregularity
of organ function, which is hereditarily transmissible. The weakened
vessel walls yield to strain, and thus produce local stomach, bowel,
liver, gland, and kidney disorders. This organ weakness may alone be
transmitted to the offspring. The functions of the great glands (thyroid,
thymus, suprarenals, pituitary body, bone-marrow, testicles and ovaries)
which secrete principles necessary to the equal balance of nutrition are
perverted. The liver, in the acute but more particularly the chronic
contagions, paralysed in nerve tone, fails in its function of
poison-destroyer, as for the same reason the kidneys fail in their power
of ejecting hurtful waste. Through this interaction of perverted
nutrition, imperfect poison-destruction, and deficient waste ejection
result and continue the states of nervous exhaustion after the contagions
and infections. Thus nerve exhaustion with its suspicion, its capricious
hopefulness and gaiety, is practically continuous in tuberculosis,
syphilis, and leprosy.
The acute and chronic contagions and infections so lower cell vitality
through the perverted functions described that inert connective tissue
replaces healthy working cells. This is especially the case with syphilis,
which, when driven from the system, leaves behind it a tendency to disease
based on this connective tissue increase. This tendency, latent in the
ancestor, may be so intensified in the descendant as to produce the
hereditary ataxias (loss of movement power), and like neuroses. At the
periods of stress such tendencies are peculiarly potent, and not only
check, but reverse development. The chronic contagions and infections are
most fertile sources of human degeneracy since their weakened products are
enabled to survive under modern beneficence. Of these chronic contagions
two (tuberculosis and syphilis) alone deserve attention, since the third
(leprosy) exerts but little influence. Despite its existence for more than
a century (New Brunswick and Nova Scotia on the north and Louisiana on the
south) on the borders of the United States, despite its subsequent
importation from Norway, Sweden, China, and Hawaii, its spread has been
infinitesimal, and its influence on race deterioration is still less
demonstrable.
Tuberculosis ("the white death") is from every standpoint a social danger
more serious than syphilis. The father, as in syphilis, can infect the
mother, but sterility is much less likely. As has already been shown in
the chapter on heredity, plural and quickly repeated birth are common in
tuberculous families. The tuberculous diathesis (or "habit," as Weismann
calls it) was very early observed in the United States. Nearly seventy
years ago W. P. Dewees, of Philadelphia, pointed out its frequency and its
early observation by the Greek and Roman physicians. He cites a case
illustrative of the extent and uniformity of diathesis in a very numerous
family. This predisposition arose on the side of the mother, though she
lived herself to the age of forty-three, a period much exceeding that of
any of her children, with the exception of a son, who died in his
forty-fifth year. This lady bore twenty-three children without being able
to suckle any but the two first. The males much exceed the females in
number, yet there did not appear to be any exception to their favour in
the transmission of the phthisical taint, except that they attained in
general a greater age before they died. Some died about puberty, others at
manhood or womanhood; but all, with the exception just stated, under
thirty. The disease was never very rapid; they generally complained from
one to two years before they died. The men had a healthy, even in some
instances an athletic, appearance until the disease became open and
decided. In their growth and stature they altogether resembled the father,
who was not only a remarkably stout man, but lived beyond the eightieth
year. The females, who passed puberty (two in number) were rather stout
women, while the mother was both delicate and small. This family lived in
the country, was very wealthy, and always accustomed to the various means
generally found successful either in destroying the predisposition or
lessening its influence, yet in no one instance in this family were they
successful, though the open form of the disease was retarded perhaps in
all. The females died the earliest.[168]
The blood vessel system is affected as regards development in such
families. The heart is often diminutive; the right ventricle is
exaggerated. Two great types of degenerate constitutions are produced in
children of the tuberculous. One of these may well come under De
Giovanni's category of the torpid. The victim is usually coarse-featured
and coarse-skinned, with peculiarly unstable mentality; slowness of
comprehension is combined with power of continuity of thought; at times
mental apathy alternates with quickness of perception. Decided
exaggeration of the lymphatic system (connected with utilising of material
elsewhere than at the point where it has been rendered unfit) with
deficient function occurs, resulting in fitting a soil for germs. In other
respects the torpid resembles the second type, the erethistic (nervously
fussy type) of De Giovanni. This is generally characterised by the
presence of a clear complexion, a fine skin, and features well cut and
often beautiful. The lips are red and the teeth pearly white, though
liable to early decay, and the eyes are large and full, the pupil being
widely dilated and the white of the eye beautifully clear. The eyelashes
are long, curved and silky, and the blue veins show distinctly through the
clear thin skin. The bones are light, the hands and feet well formed, the
stature often tall, and the whole figure slightly and gracefully built.
The erethists generally remain spare, and have a strong dislike to fatty
food. They are vivacious and excitable, and the intellectual faculties are
often highly developed. At an early age they show marvellous activity. The
regularity with which such precocious tubercular children die has given
rise to proverbs anent exceptionally clever children that they are "too
wise to live long." Wanting in stamina, they are incapable of prolonged
exertion either of mind or body, and break down under conditions which
would not prove injurious to the healthy. They are continually taking
"cold," and are prone throughout life to affections of an inflammatory
character. Multiple and frequent pregnancies occur. The children,
deficient in vitality, are carried off in numbers during infancy by
convulsions, brain fever, water on the brain, exhaustion, diarrhoea,
teething, and other ailments, or they succumb at the second detention or
at puberty. A small proportion reach maturity. Few live beyond thirty-five
or forty years of age. However brilliant intellectually, they are equally
emotional, impressionable, and impulsive. There is a marked absence of
mental stability. They are suspiciously capricious. The great secreting
and eliminating glands undergo with peculiar frequency the perversions
already described.
Neuroses and psychoses are peculiarly frequent in childhood and youth. The
degenerative power of tuberculosis is not always due to the influence of
the germ, or even of the toxin produced by it, but to the state of nerve
weakness resultant on the disorder. The victim of tuberculosis (especially
if affecting the lung) is a suspicious, yet hopeful, nervous invalid,
whose functions are irregularly performed and who is therefore likely to
leave scions with greater defect, especially as the maternal factor,
either through infection or worry, can hardly escape being weakened.
Tuberculosis attacks the bones of the offspring, especially the spine and
hip-joint, but the victim of these last frequently regain health after
apparent recovery from the local disease through surgical procedures. If
the victim of the hip-joint disorder be of the erethist type marriage is
not unlikely. Despite the deformity produced by spine disorder, popular
superstition as to the "good luck" of a hunchback leads to marriage among
the working class. Monetary and social considerations effect the same
result among the wealthy classes. Here deformity does not prevent
marriage, but predisposes to sterility through birth difficulty.
The influence of syphilis is, in a general sense, the same as that of
tuberculosis, except that by reversing the principle of individuation it
leads to greater sterility. Furthermore it exhibits greater tendencies to
revert towards health, and yields (even in the inherited form) more to
medicinal treatment. The inherited form at times presents itself in two
types closely simulating those due to tuberculosis. Like the bacillus of
tuberculosis, the syphilitic germ attacks every structure and organ of the
body. Its reversal of the principle of individuation, causing excessive
cell formation, produces more decidedly demonstrable effects. As syphilis
is more apt to attack the central nervous system than tuberculosis, it
would seem that it is a greater race-deteriorating factor. The excessive
tendency to cell formation, however, produces impotence in man, sterility
and abortion in woman. There are very good reasons for believing that the
race is becoming immune to syphilis, and that this disease will disappear.
Its greatest race-deteriorating effect is in preparing the soil for
tuberculosis and other infections and contagions.
The influence of contagions and infections on degeneracy is therefore by
no means slight. Each disease can produce grave constitutional defects in
the ancestor likely to be intensified in the offspring. The greatest
social dangers result from tuberculosis; the next from syphilis. Typhoid
fever, scarlatina, small-pox, measles, diphtheria, whooping-cough, and all
other contagions, however, may produce these constitutional defects,
either through the mother during pregnancy or through their secondary
effects on the ancestor's constitution. If the subject be attacked before
the close of the periods of dental stress an arrest of development of the
bones of the face may result with irregularities in the shape and position
of the teeth. These, then, are stigmata of degeneracy, especially due, in
the individual presenting them, to the contagions and infections rather
than to inheritance alone.
CHAPTER VIII
CLIMATE, SOIL, AND FOOD
Among the factors constituting environment few have impressed the
biologist so much as climate, soil, and food. The seeming modifications
produced by these have made a very decided impression on the sceptical
Weismann, who stated that "the possibility is not to be rejected that
influences continued for a long time, that is, for generations, such as
temperature, climate, kind of nourishment, &c., which may affect the germ
plasm, as well as any other part of the organism, may produce a change in
the constitution of the germ plasm. But such influences would not then
produce individual variations, but would necessarily modify, in the same
way, all the individuals of a species living in a certain district. It is
possible, though it cannot be proved, that many climatic varieties have
arisen in this manner. Possibly other phenomena of variation must be
referred to a variation in the structure of the germ plasm produced
directly by external influences."
Considering the changes brought about in European plants and animals in
Australia, those occurring in the East Indian mongoose in Jamaica, the
changes in European plants and animals in America, or American animals in
Europe and European animals in Asia, Weismann's position seems judicial.
The influences dependent on food, soil, and climate producing normal
modifications have been remarkably illustrated in the gilled batrachian
Axolotl. This, under the nourishment and change of surroundings of the
Jardin des Plantes, was transformed into a gill-less batrachian, which had
hitherto been regarded as belonging to a totally distinct family.
According to Darwin,[169] English dogs degenerate in India in a few
generations, losing the peculiarities of form and mental character which
distinguish their particular race, in spite of the greatest care in
selection and prevention of crossing. An instance which well deserves the
consideration of those anthropologists who attach but little importance to
the influence of the environment and to the value of speech as an aid to
the ethnologist is that of the Wurtemburgers, who settled (1816) near
Tiflis in Russia. They had originally fair or red hair, light or blue eyes
and coarse, broad features. In the first generation brown hair and black
eyes began to appear; in the second black hair and eyes became the rule,
while the face acquired an oval form. These changes were due entirely to
the surroundings, no instance of crossing with Georgian natives being on
record. At the same time, these transformed Wurtemburgers continue to
speak their German mother-tongue uninfluenced by the local dialects.[170]
The alleged transformation of the British into the Yankee is commonly
cited in illustration of the supposed effects of soil and climate. Three
decades[171] ago Vogt remarked that American Anglo-Saxons or Yankees were
instanced as illustration of change of character. Already, after the
second generation, according to Pruner-Bey, the Yankee presents features
of the Indian type. At a later period the glandular system is reduced to
the minimum of its normal development. The skin becomes like leather; the
colour of the cheeks is replaced by sallowness. The head becomes smaller
and rounder, and is covered with stiff, dark hair; the neck becomes
longer, and there is greater development of the cheek-bones and the
masseters. The temporal fossæ becomes deeper, the jaw-bones more massive,
the eyes lie in deep approximated sockets. The iris is dark, the glance is
piercing and wild. The long bones, especially in the superior extremities,
are lengthened so that the gloves manufactured in England and France for
the American market are of a particular make, with very long fingers. The
female pelvis approaches that of the male. According to Quatrefages,
America has thus, from the English race, produced a new white race which
might be called the Yankee race. Vogt believes that America dries up the
skin and reduces the fat, an effect to which all the above differences
might be reduced. That the head becomes smaller he utterly denies. Exact
cranial measurements by Morton show that the skull of the Yankee is at
least as large as that of the Englishman.
Similar changes have been noted in the Anglo-Saxon Australians. The true
explanation of this is that early rigorous environment tended to cause
reversion to types not uncommon even now in Great Britain, Ireland, and
Scandinavia, resultant on the admixture of primitive types to which
reference has been made. The same error has been made about the pelvis as
about the skull. The male pelvis in the American is approximating the
female in accordance with advance, since, as Havelock Ellis has
shown,[172] not only by his skull, but by his pelvis, modern man is
following a path first marked out by woman. The skull of the modern woman
is more markedly feminine than that of the savage woman, while that of the
modern man has approximated to it. Not only is the pelvis of the modern
woman much more feminine in character than that of the primitive woman,
but the modern man's pelvis is also becoming more feminine.
The validity of Vogt's position anent the "Yankee" change of type is fully
demonstrated by the following portraits of four generations of a noted
American family with a Scandinavian patronymic, coming originally from a
district in England where the alleged "Yankee" type (even to its nasal
tone and so-called "Americanisms") occurs. The first "American" of the
family (Fig. 3) was born in Connecticut in 1761 and died in 1826. He had a
dolichocephalic head with massive jaws, prominent lips, especially the
upper. The nose is long and the eyes are set close together, the forehead
very high and straight. Quite a change is noticeable in the second
generation (Fig. 4). The face is not so long, the lateral diameter of the
head is larger, the forehead more prominent, and the eyes are a little
farther apart. The nose is about the same length and while there is a
resemblance about the mouth and chin, the distance from the front of the
chin to the tip of the nose is not quite so long. The change seems to be
due to shortening of the chin.
[Illustration: FIG. 3.--DOLICHOCEPHALIC.]
[Illustration: FIG. 4.--MESOCEPHALIC.]
[Illustration: FIG. 5.--MESOCEPHALIC.]
[Illustration: FIG. 6.--BRACHYCEPHALIC.]
The next generation (Fig. 5) shows still further changes. The forehead is
broader and less retreating than either. There is perceptibly lest
prognathism. There is less prominence in the supraorbital region.
The fourth generation exhibits (Fig. 6) a nearly brachycephalic head. The
head is nearly round, forehead full, eyes set in the head to correspond
with its width, nose broad, upper lips short, and the lower jaw is
evidently much shorter in a perpendicular line. These changes are due to a
protruding forehead, receding chin, and delicate features.
The climate of the United States exercises, according to certain
sociologists, on the first generation of European immigrants, a
deleterious influence in regard to fecundity. The decrease in the
fecundity of the American woman has been charged to various anti-social
causes (abortion and prevention of conception) and to a "nervousness"
induced by the climate. A seemingly fair test of the influence of the
climate would be a race elsewhere fecund, and whose religion encourages
fecundity, decreasing in the first generation after immigration to the
United States. Such a race is the Jewish. According to Gihon's analysis of
the United States census of 1890[173] the Jewish birth rate is
diminishing. From the mothers born in the United States the average is
3·56 children, as against 5·24 for those born in Germany, 5·36 for those
in Russia and Poland, 5·27 for those in Hungary, and 5·44 for those in
Bohemia. These figures, however, do not demonstrate the influence of
climate, but of environment. The Jew, unlike the earlier American
colonists, is not exposed to the stress of frontier life. He has a more
favourable mental and physical environment than on the continent of
Europe. This fact, therefore, does not demonstrate the effects of climate,
but is really chargeable to climate, food, soil, and other factors
constituting environment. That climate cannot be considered apart from
these factors is shown, as I pointed out several years ago, by the fact
that the United States surveyors in Minnesota reported to the national
authorities that it was impossible to live the whole year in that state
because of the extremely cold winter. Now, not only do people live and
cultivate the soil throughout the entire state, but large cities have
sprung up still farther north, and the country around has become well
populated. Hence, in dealing with influences of climate, change of food
and hygienic conditions must be taken into account. The error of the
American surveyors as to the acclimatisation of the white race in cold
climates has been emphasised as to the tropics and arctics. Here, however,
the same error has been demonstrated by very careful researches. The
experience of the Arctic regions as to necessity for change in diet and
hygiene has been fully borne out by observations on the Anglo-Saxon in the
tropics. The early experience of the English in India, upon which a fatal
prognosis as to the future of British India was based, turns out to have
been erroneous.
The influence of climate involves more than temperature. Stokvis, in a
paper read before the Tenth International Medical Congress, at Berlin, on
the comparative pathology of the human races with reference to the vital
resistance of Europeans in tropical climates,[174] finds that the
European immigrant in the tropics is assailed by two hostile forces:
tropico-thermal and tropico-infectious agencies. The expression of innate
racial peculiarities, like the variations of vegetable life and the
varieties of animal life from effects of increased temperature, are such
as occur in the inhabitants of temperate regions during the height of
summer.
Marestang and Eykman find that neither high temperature alone nor
meteorological agencies, apart from other deleterious influences, can
produce that impoverishment of blood called "tropical anæmia." Stokvis
shows that the tropical European does not prove inferior to the aboriginal
with respect to thermal agencies. He is less susceptible to chill than the
native. Mortality statistics of respiratory organ affections are greater
for the native. While the European suffers more from liver disease than
the native, the latter is less addicted to alcoholic drinks and pork. The
percentage of deaths from cases treated is, however, more than twice as
great with the native as with the European. Variations of physiologic life
under tropical thermal conditions have little to do with the race. The
vital resistance of the immigrant European (the European transformed into
a permanent high-summer man) is somewhat greater than that of the native
races.
Respecting the disease-producing effects of tropical infectious agencies,
the experience of the last ten years (1880-90) is very different from that
prior to 1860.
Average annual death-rate per thousand:--
European Native
Soldiers. Soldiers.
{ 1819-28 170·0 138·0
Dutch East India Army { 1869-78 60·4 38·7
{ 1879-88 30·6 40·7
{ 1800-28 84·6 18·03
{ 1828-56 56·7
British India Army { 1869-78 19·37
{ 1876-88 16·27 21·6
{ 1820-36 121·00 30·0
British Army, Jamaica { 1879-88 11·02 11·62
These changes are the consequence of sound sanitation. "The fairest laurel
practical hygiene may boast of to-day is, doubtless, the laurel acquired
in ameliorating the sanitary conditions of the European soldiers in
tropical climates." A century ago James Lind said, "Much more than to the
climate you are indebted to your own ignorance and negligence for the
disease from which you suffer in tropical climates."
These statistics do not entirely support the declaration of Hippocrates
that "races are the daughter of climates," but tend to show that the vital
resistance of the different races in tropical climates depends more on
external conditions than on race. Acclimatibility of strong, healthy,
adult Europeans of both sexes in tropical climates must be admitted
without any reserve, provided that they assiduously observe all hygienic
rules. Stokvis disproves the allegation that the European is not able to
produce in tropical regions more than three or four generations of true
European blood, and that from the third or fourth generation onward
sterility is the rule.
So accustomed, remarked Felken, however, is a man to his environment that
it is difficult to remove an European from his home in the temperate
region to any other, and yet for him to retain his health. Much may be
done in the tropics to render climate more salubrious and sanitary
precautions will do a great deal for the health of the community. But when
all is done permanent residence for Europeans under European conditions is
out of the question in the low-lying regions of the tropics. Comparatively
few areas exist in the tropics where any great success for European
colonisation can be prophesied from altitude alone. The influence of
altitude on the physiologic characteristics is, however, very evident. The
residents at high altitudes are strong, robust, buoyant, and of great
mental and physical endurance.
In disproof of this position of Felken, Viault, of Bordeaux, has shown
that the phenomena resultant on the acclimation of man at great altitudes
comes neither from the frequency of respiratory movements nor from greater
activity of the pulmonary circulation as has been asserted, but from
increase of red blood globules. While the effects of both excessive heat
and excessive cold may be admitted, even there other factors play a part.
Very high mean temperature with low humidity is more likely to result in
sunstroke and allied conditions than high temperature with high humidity.
Low temperature of the Arctic regions tends to produce anæmia in natives
of temperate zones. Food and depressing circumstances have, however, to be
taken into consideration.
Sunstroke produces the ordinary phenomena of nervous exhaustion, but the
patient becomes more irritable, suspicious, and extremely proud. As these
patients are not recognised for a long times as insane they often marry
and produce degenerates. Kiernan reports a case in which father and mother
(both of healthy stock) were overcome by the heat during one of the
processions of the American Centenaries. The children born before the
sunstroke were healthy, but there had been no children for five years
previously. A year subsequent to the sunstroke (which was followed by a
change in character in both parents) the woman had triplets, one of which
died soon after birth from convulsions. The second of the triplets, a
girl, became epileptic at 2, a prostitute at 16, and chronically insane at
20. The third triplet became a puberty lunatic at 16. Of three children
subsequently born, two are epileptics and one is a moral imbecile who
manifests premonitory evidences of paranoia. Sunstroke, however, underlies
many cases of alcoholism. Not a few of the instances of degeneration
charged to alcoholism are, in reality, due to the nervous condition
arising from the exhaustion produced by sunstroke. To this factor was in
no small degree due the extremely large infant mortality of the English in
India of the first half of the present century. While temperature plays a
part in producing degeneracy in the offspring through its production of
systemic disorder in the ancestor, it is usually associated with other
factors which aid or predispose to its effects. It also predisposes to the
greater action of other causes. Very frequently the sun-struck person,
rendered incapable of continued labour by irritability, becomes a tramp or
a pauper, either of which conditions tends to accelerate the degenerative
process and furthermore to increase the possible chances of passing down
the effect through heredity by the ease with which illicit relationships
are contracted. The least intelligent of the prostitute class, or rather,
of that class of nymphomaniacs who have not fully entered upon a
prostitute career, are driven into the workhouse or almshouse, where they
often remain for years, or depart at intervals, leaving their offspring to
be reared at public expense. The number of such children born yearly in
almshouses is at least ten thousand in the United States.[175] An enormous
proportion of these die in infancy but sufficient survive to form a potent
source of degenerates.
The influence of overheating further predisposes to the attack of microbes
even in the temperate climates, and to constitutional defects resultant on
these.
A factor of degeneracy as related to soil on which much stress has been
laid, is that of goitre. This has been carefully studied by Munson[176]
among the Indians on the reservation in the United States. The number was
77,173, of whom 2·36 per cent. had goitre. As regards geographic
distribution the disease is more prevalent in the southern part of
Montana. Goitre was reported as practically unknown among the white
settlers living about the reservations where goitre was prevalent among
the Indians. Fully 80 per cent. of the cases occur in Indian women, the
disease being not only much less frequent, but also less decided and less
extensive in the male. The average age of onset of the disease was from 12
to 14 years. There are many instances illustrating the apparent heredity
of goitre. Several consecutive generations show its development. Only one
case is reported in which goitre was associated with cretinism. Goitre
among Indians cannot be traced to high altitudes, climate or water
containing excess of calcium magnesium salts. The disease is apparently
due to insanitary surroundings, depressing constitutional conditions,
improper and excessively nitrogenous diet. This condition of things among
the Indians bears an important relation to the facts pointed out by C. K.
Clarke,[177] of Kingston, Ontario, who found in the Canadian asylums a
large number of goitrous patients and one goitrous attendant. The goitrous
patients, who were of long residence, had come from all parts of the
dominion. The size of the goitre was in proportion to the length of the
residence. It is possible that local influence may have much to do with
the disease, though it is evident that the insane are much more liable to
it than normal persons. W. B. Fletcher, of Indianapolis, has observed
similar frequency as to goitre among the insane there, especially among
the foreigners and their immediate descendants. Cretinism, according to
Morel, was degeneracy due to a special action which a toxic principle
exercises on a cerebro-spinal system, whether by the air that is breathed
or by the substances ingested in the economy, and which, above all,
appears to have some relation to a soil where predominates the magnesian
limestone. That the last factor has some influence is shown by the fact
that goitrous enlargements are encountered in medical practice in Chicago
much more frequently than among the corresponding classes in the East. The
water in Chicago contains magnesium-lime salts, whether it be derived from
the lake or from the artesian well. The fact, however, that the Indians
and the insane exhibit a tendency to goitre indicates that behind the
influence of the soil or of diet lies a neuropathic constitution, whether
this be inherited or acquired. Cretinism is much more frequent in the
United States than was apparent ere the discovery of the value of the
thyroid glands in treatment. Under the stimulus of investigation for cases
in which to try this treatment, medical literature from all parts of the
United States has been filled with reports of authenticated cases. Among
these are scions of families which have been American for more than three
generations and which may, therefore, be considered as products of an
American environment. The same condition of things has occurred in both
Great Britain and on the European continent in districts which, prior to
1890, were supposed to be free from cretinism. This illustrates the
results of stimulus given investigation in biology rather than increase of
the disorder.
The influence of spoiled maize in producing the mixed skin, nervous and
mental disorder known as pellagra in the Italians, would seem, from the
results of the researches of Billod,[178] to be chiefly due to the
conjoined effects of unhygienic surroundings, the offspring of climate and
soil. The fungus on maize (ustilago), like the fungus on rye (ergot),
produces rather long-lasting neurosis of an epileptic character,
susceptible to transmission to the offspring of women poisoned by these
fungi. The Italian disease, pellagra, manifests the features one would
expect from an improper food taken under unhygienic conditions. While this
is undoubtedly exaggerated by the habits of the peasantry in Italy, still
in a lesser degree like effects of food are observable in other races.
The influence of the potato diet in degenerating the Irish Celt in
comparison with the Scottish Celt under the same conditions, is difficult
at present to determine for lack of data. Certainly the descendants of
this class of Irish Celts rapidly regain a handsome, healthy status under
mixed American diet, even though the hygienic surroundings in the great
cities be not the best. He who has to treat a class of neurasthenics in
whom starch digestion is impaired finds that a diet of potatoes
(undoubtedly through the auto-intoxication it produces) will increase
certain nervous symptoms, and hence the tendency to transmission to the
next generation.
In the families of the pioneers in the United States, as well as the
families of farmers in secluded valleys in Norway, Switzerland, and
elsewhere, the influence of monotony of diet, aggravated by monotony of
surroundings, has undoubtedly produced a large amount of degeneracy. Ray
Brigham of New York, Awl of Ohio, and Patterson of Illinois have shown
that there is an unusual frequency of insanity in farmers' wives which is
undoubtedly traceable to these conditions. Kiernan, of Chicago, has
reported a case fairly typical of those earlier described by the American
alienists just cited. The first generation was a woman of New England
stock, of tireless energy, to whom work was a pleasure and rest an
abhorrence, and who lived on a farm miles from the town. She did all her
own work and brought up a large family, chiefly on maize, potatoes, and
bread, pork being the meat diet. At 50 this woman removed with her
husband, who had grown wealthy, to a small country town. Here she
conducted the entire work of the household without a servant. At 52 she
broke down with neurasthenia, which rapidly passed into periodical gloomy
spells, in one of which she committed suicide. Her youngest daughter, who
had an asymmetrical face, has the periodical gloomy tendency of the
mother, alternating with periods of restlessness, which evince themselves
in doing unnecessarily the work of the servants and other labours
inconsistent with her husband's social status. She had at times suicidal
and homicidal impulses. She has three children; one exhibits no special
abnormality; the eldest, a boy of eleven, dislikes to play with boys
because they are rough, and plays with girls, to whom he is at times
mischievously cruel. He likes to sew and make doll's clothing and purchase
dolls, while there are other indications of sexual abnormality. The
youngest, a girl, has frequent attacks of epileptic-like fury, although
between these she is kind-hearted, good-humoured, and very affectionate.
In dealing with the question of soil, the factors predisposing to the
attacks of the parasite of malaria have to be taken into consideration;
certainly the inhabitants of certain malarial districts exhibit all the
characteristics of degenerates.
The influence of nutrition in producing nervous states likely to be
transmitted as degeneracy in the offspring are excellently illustrated in
the nervous disorders due to improper nutrition during youth. This may, as
W. S. Christopher[179] of Chicago has shown, produce all possible neuroses
to which the organism may be liable. Such neuroses relate to--
A. Psychic faculties.
B. Sensation.
1. Anæsthesia.
2. Hyperæsthesia.
3. Hyperalgia (increased pain sense).
C. Heat production.
1. Elevation of temperature.
2. Depression of temperature.
D. Muscular tissues.
1. Hypertrophy.
2. Atrophy.
3. Paralysis.
4. Convulsions.
E. Skeletal muscles.
1. General convulsions.
2. Chorea.
3. Tetany (toe and finger jerks).
F. Pharynx.
1. Dyspnoea (difficult breathing).
G. Oesophagus.
1. Dysphagia (difficult swallowing).
H. Stomach.
1. Vomiting.
2. Merycism (rumination).
I. Intestines.
1. Increased peristalsis (movement of bowel).
2. Decreased peristalsis.
J. Larynx.
1. Dyspnoea.
2. Laryngismus stridulus (croup spasm).
3. Chorea.
K. Bronchi.
1. Asthma.
2. Bronchorrhoea (excessive secretion).
L. Bladder.
1. Incontinence.
2. Retention.
M. Urethra.
1. Spasmodic stricture.
N. Uterus.
1. Neuralgias.
2. Spasms.
O. Vagina.
1. Vaginismus (painful spasm).
P. Heart.
1. Chorea.
2. Disturbance of rate.
3. Disturbance of rhythm.
Q. Secretory organs.
1. Decrease of secretion.
2. Modification of composition of secretion.
R. Absorptive organs.
S. Elaborative organs.
T. Respiratory organs. Other than those cited.
U. Excretory organs.
V. Reproductory organs.
Those of the genital organs only exist in precocious childhood, while
still others occur, some occasionally, some very frequently.
Of the psychic neuroses, perhaps the commonest are the night terrors,
which occur in ill-nourished children with great frequency. Hyperesthesia
(or increased sensitiveness) is a starvation neurosis occurring especially
in unrecognised scurvy. Variations of temperature, both increased and
subnormal, occur in children suffering from evident in-nutrition.
Of the starvation neuroses, the commonest are muscular convulsions.
Naturally enough, any muscle or any group of muscles may be affected, and
the manifestations may present all the varieties of convulsive movements
to which muscles are liable. Probably no child whose nutrition is perfect
ever has general convulsions except as the result of actual brain disease
or at the onset of some infectious process where the convulsion takes the
place of the initial chill of the adult. The so-called reflex convulsions
occur only in children whose nutrition is below par. In a rickety child
the slight irritation produced by an erupting tooth may be sufficient to
weaken the mechanism which checks explosive action, just as in the same
child it may be the determining cause of bronchorrhoea. In the healthy
child teething can cause no such effect. Both these manifestations, the
convulsions and the bronchorrhoea, are starvation neuroses. In such
children many other trivial conditions may weaken the controlling
mechanism.
In older children chorea, whatever be its cause, is evidently connected
with the developmental process. The beneficial effects in chorea of
absolute rest in bed and forced feeding are a matter of common
observation. Dysphagia as a neurosis in children is uncommon. Vomiting and
diarrhoea occur so frequently in infants from a wide variety of causes,
that it is very difficult to say when they are merely starvation neuroses.
In rickets, diarrhoea often occurs, with no adequate explanation in the
conditions present in the intestinal canal, and which is an essential
feature of the disease itself.
Laryngismus stridulus is a very common manifestation of muscular
starvation neurosis. Spasmodic asthma occurs in ill-nourished children.
Incontinence of urine in older children is often a starvation neurosis.
The younger the child the more rapid are its processes of growth. Hence in
infants the results of defective nutrition are quickly manifested, and the
curative effects of food arranged to supply the nutritive deficiencies
also become apparent very soon. In older children with more stable tissues
a defective food supply is longer borne without apparent effect; but, on
the other hand, the beneficial effect of an antidotal diet becomes
apparent only after a prolonged use.
The relatively simple diet of the infant makes it easy to discover the
particular kind of food which is supplied in sufficient quantity, and
makes the supply of the deficiency comparatively easy. But in older
children with a more varied diet the defect is less readily discovered and
less readily supplied.
The effects of climate, soil, and food in the production of degeneracy are
first shown in the causation of general loss of nerve tone in the
ancestor, often with special local expressions. This loss of nerve tone
may show itself in the offspring by any type of degeneracy from nutritive
defect to loss of moral tone.
CHAPTER IX
SCHOOL STRAIN
Like all factors of degeneracy, school strain evinces itself in a systemic
nervous exhaustion manifest along lines of least resistance, as in the
neuroses of Christopher. The first types of his neuroses are due to
overstrain of certain territories related with memory, as contrasted with
diminished use of the association fibres connecting these. As Schopenhauer
has excellently observed, man is one-third intellect and two-thirds will,
and much of this last two-thirds is the result of training. Capacity for
training may be greater in one individual than another, because of
inherited or congenital deficiencies. It is, as Sully[180] remarks, "a
happy circumstance in healthy children that that most prolific excitant of
fear, the presentation of something new and uncanny, is also provocative
of curiosity, with its impulse to look and examine. A very tiny child, on
first making acquaintance with some form of physical pain, as a bump on
the head, will deliberately repeat the experience by knocking his head
against something as if experimenting and watching the effect. A clearer
case of curiosity overpowering fear is that of a child who, after pulling
the tail of a cat in a bush and getting scratched, proceeded to dive into
the bush again. Still more interesting here are gradual transitions from
actual fear, before the new and strange, to bold inspection. The child who
was frightened by her Japanese doll insisted on seeing it every day. The
behaviour of one of these small persons on the arrival at the house of a
strange dog, of a dark foreigner or some other startling novelty is a
pretty and amusing sight. The first overpowering timidity, the shrinking
back to the mother's breast, followed by curious peers, then by bolder
outstretchings of head and arms, mark the stage by which curiosity and
interest gain on fear, and finally leave it far behind. Very soon the
small, timorous creatures will grow into bold adventurers. They will make
playthings of the alarming animals and of the alarming shadows too. Later
on still perhaps they will love nothing so much as to probe the awful
mysteries of gunpowder."
In degenerate children, because of deficiencies of proper
inter-association of the memory territories in the brain, healthy
curiosity, and the instinct of sheltering are deficient, so that states of
uncertainty, producing terror, result. These become permanent in after
life, even when training as an adult is strongly antagonistic to them.
This is illustrated, as Harriet C. B. Alexander has shown,[181] in George
Eliot, who during childhood "suffered from a low general state of health
and great susceptibility to terror at night, and the liability to have all
her soul become a quivering fear," which remained during life. She had
periods of depression and vertex headache, which latter gave place to
sick headache, often attended with rheumatoid phenomena. "She was an
awkward girl, reserved and serious far beyond her years, but observant,
and addicted to the habit of sitting in corners and watching her elders."
Fear of the unknown in childhood, seemingly a reversion to the fear of the
unknown of savages, tends, like it, to produce occult belief. Despite the
German rationalism of George Eliot, such fear found utterance in her
_Behind the Veil_, a mystically occult contrast with her novels and with
the positivism which was her religion. Theoretically the philosophy of
George Eliot should have destroyed much mysticism, yet as a survival of
"night terrors" it came to the surface. A very vivid autobiographical
narrative of night-terrors and similar nervous phenomena in the childhood
of a distinguished man of letters will be found in Horatio Brown's _Life
of John Addington Symonds_.
School over-pressure in certain respects checks, even in well-developed
minds, the transition from the terror of the unknown of childhood into the
calm of maturity. Morbid fears, imperative conceptions, and imperative
acts which torture the individual during an otherwise healthy career
unquestionably originate in the early periods of life.
Degenerate children, as Kiernan[182] remarks, early manifest decided
neurotic excitability, and tend to neuroses at physiologic crises like the
first and second dentition, and the onset and close of puberty. Slight
physical or mental perturbation is followed by sleeplessness, delirium,
hallucinations, &c. Hyperæsthesia and excessive reaction to pleasant or
offensive impressions exist. Vasomotor instability is present, pallor,
blushing, palpitations or pre-cardial anxiety result from trivial moral or
physical excitants. There is no precocity or aberration of the sexual
instinct. The disposition is irritable. The grasshopper is a burden.
Psychic pain arises from the most trivial cause, and finds expression in
emotional outbursts. Sympathies and antipathies are equally intense. The
mental life swings between periods of exaltation and depression,
alternating with brief epochs of healthy indifference. Egotism is supreme,
and morality absent or perverted. This absence or perversion is often
concealed under the guise of moral superiority, religiosity, or cant.
Vanity and jealous suspiciousness are common. The intellect and temper are
exceedingly irregular. Monotonously feeble, scanty ideation passes readily
into seeming brilliance, even to the extent of hallucinations. But ideas
are barren as a rule, because generated so rapidly as to destroy each
other ere they pass into action. Energy fails ere aught can be completed.
The inability to distinguish between desires and facts produces seeming
mendacity. The will in its apparent exuberance, its capricious energy, and
innate futility, matches and distorts the one-sided talent or whimsical
genius which may exist. The whole of this mental state may not be present.
The tendency to introspection, to morbid fear, to gloom, to
hallucinations, to alternations of depression and exaltation, may occur in
a degenerate child in whom has been otherwise preserved that secondary ego
which is the latest and greatest acquirement of the race.
In the same class, according to George Parkman,[183] an American alienist
of more than eighty years ago, brilliant talents, astonishing facility of
receiving and communicating ideas often appear suddenly at puberty,
especially in females, to be later followed by mediocrity, disappointment,
and supineness.
These degenerate children have a tendency, as C. F. Folsom[184] remarks,
to manifest aberrant tendencies at the periods of stress, which may, in
Folsom's judgment, be congenital, or due to early interference with normal
brain development. These show themselves in childhood and infancy by
irregularity or disturbed sleep, irritability, apprehension, strange
ideas, great sensitiveness to external impressions, high temperature,
delirium or convulsions from slight causes, disagreeable dreams and
visions, romancing, intense feeling, periodic headache, muscular
twitching, capricious appetite, and great intolerance of stimulants and
narcotics. At puberty developmental anomalies, and not infrequently
perverted sexual instincts, are observed in both sexes. During adolescence
there is often excessive shyness or bravado, always introspection and
self-consciousness, and sometimes abeyance or absence of the sexual
instinct, which, however, is frequently of extraordinary intensity. The
imitative and imaginative faculties may be quick. The affections or
emotions are vehement but shallow. Vehement dislikes are formed, and
intense personal attachments result in extraordinary friendships, which
not seldom swing around suddenly into bitter enmity or indifference. The
passions are unduly a force in the character, which lacks will power. The
individual's higher brain centres are not well inhibited, and he dashes
about like a ship without a rudder, fairly well if the winds be fair and
the seas be calm, but dependent on the elements for the character and the
time of the final wreck. Invention, poetry, music, artistic taste,
philanthropy, intensity, and originality, are sometimes of a higher order
among these persons, but desultory, half-finished work and shiftlessness
are much more common. With many of them concentrated, sustained effort,
and attempts to keep them to it are impossible. Their common-sense
perception of the relations of life, executive or business faculty and
judgment are seldom well developed. The memory is now and then
extraordinary. They are apt to be self-conscious, egotistic, and morbidly
conscious. They easily become victims of insomnia, neurasthenia,
hypochondria, neuroticism, hysteria, or insanity. They offend against the
proprieties of life and commit crime with less cause or provocation than
other persons. While many of them are among the most gifted and attractive
people in their community, the majority are otherwise, and possess an
uncommon capacity for making fools of themselves, and of being a nuisance
to their friends and of little use to the world.
These conditions occur from heredity in degenerates, but, as Francis
Warner[185] remarks, while "it is very common to see disordered conditions
of the nervous system in children with defective construction of body,
these nerve disturbances may also be seen in children with normal
construction of body. Such signs result from the disorder, produced by
special circumstances, aiding as well as producing defect which results
from, or in the next generation becomes, defect in original construction.
Among the signs of fatigue in children is the slight amount of force
expended in movement, often with asymmetry of balance in the body. The
fatigued centres may be unequally exhausted; spontaneous finger twitches
like those of younger children may be seen, and slight movements may be
excited by noises. The head is often held on one side. The arms when
extended are not held horizontally. Usually the left is lower. The face is
no evidence of bodily nutrition. It may be well nourished, yet the body be
thin. Three per cent. of the children seen in school are below par in
nutrition. These children are of lower general constitutional power. They
tend to an ill-nourished condition under the stress of life, and many
cases of mental excitement which, while they render them sharper mentally,
militate against general nutrition."
Colin A. Scott has found corroborative evidences of similar effects of
strain in the children of the New England and Illinois schools.
These systemic nervous exhaustions may, as W. S. Christopher, of Chicago,
has shown (in remarks on neuroses already cited), take unexpected local
directions, especially involving, in accordance with the general law of
reversal, evolution or degeneracy checks on excessive action. Among the
conditions produced by school strain of serious consequence in after-life
are headaches, usually charged to anæmia or neurasthenia. These headaches,
as Sachs,[186] of New York, has shown, usually appear after emotional
excitement or fatiguing ordeal. There are other symptoms expressive of
neurasthenia, such as slight tremor of the tongue and fingers and
exaggeration of the deep reflexes, but, above all, the very persistent
vertex headache, and the child's description of pressure or heat there. In
children emotional conditions, school strain, rivalry between class-mates,
are as liable to produce neurasthenia as are the more serious struggles
for existence in later life. These headaches may pass very readily at
periods of stress into migraine. The vertigo characteristic of migraine is
not rarely found in the neurasthenic headache of childhood. What is true
of migraine is also true of epilepsy. The tremors, &c., accompanying
neurasthenic headache become the convulsions of epilepsy. G. B. Fowler
reports a case emphasising very clearly the position of Christopher. It
was that of a seven-year-old boy of mushroom growth and hothouse culture.
He began every day before breakfast with an hour at Spanish, and until
three in the afternoon was unceasingly occupied with French, German,
music, and the ordinary school curriculum. This policy, initiated four
years before, the pressure being gradually increased, had been maintained
almost without interruption. The child had consequently developed into a
sort of phonograph, capable of starting automatic expressions which
afforded much entertainment to visitors, and gave the ambitious father
great hope and comfort. Under such conditions it is not to be wondered at
that something gave way, and, fortunately for the brain, it was the
sphincter of the anus. When this deplorable occurrence first took place
the child was sharply reprimanded; the accident repeating itself, however,
two or three times weekly, and later about once a day, more pronounced
measures were instituted. The boy was often severely flogged, deprived of
liberty, luxuries, &c., yet without avail. The lower bowel was perfectly
normal. The sphincter was tight, grasped the finger with the usual
firmness, and there were no sources of irritation about the anus. The
abnormal conditions under which the child had been living very naturally
at the outset were the cause of the difficulty. Cessation of the
punishment and release from books was ordered. The result was
satisfactory. In three weeks the involuntary discharge became gradually
less frequent, and finally ceased altogether.
Mental strain produces precisely similar effects on the nerve control of
the stomach. All types of nervous disturbances of the stomach--merycism
(cud-chewing), bulimia (ox appetite), acoria (incapacity for getting
enough)--result, as Ewald[187] has shown, from nerve strain, and increase
this through auto-intoxication.
The sphincter of bladder often gives way, and is a very frequent
expression of nervous exhaustion in the child, often increased by the
effects of nerve strain on the kidneys, which do their work of
purification imperfectly, while excreting nearly pure water. The enormous
quantity of clear urine passed during worry is a generally recognised
expression of such strain. This nerve-strain interference with the
purifying work of the kidneys leads to increased strain on the liver and
other glands, whence result migraine, the uric acid states, rheumatisms,
and the other perversions of nutrition. Nerve-strain on either liver,
bowel, or other glands, has similar secondary effects on the kidneys. In
part this is an organ degeneracy in function whereby man's liver and
kidneys do the work of the sauropsidal liver and kidneys.
Among the nutritive disturbances resulting from nerve-strain is the fatty
anæmia of Weir Mitchell, the juvenile obesity of Féré and others. This is
generally associated with the uric acid states which so often result from
school strain. The apparent improvement shown in increased weight leads to
increased strain, and many of these fat victims of school over-pressure
enter insane hospitals as puberty lunatics.
Other effects of the nutritive disturbances produced by school strain are
local irritations about the sexual organs. These may arise from irritation
by uric acid of the mouth of the bladder in boys, or of the vagina and
bladder in girls. Neurotic persons are liable to nerve storms, which
express themselves in emotional displays or restlessness or nagging
tendencies. These often coincide with the uric acid tendency to express
itself in "storms," like other periodical phenomena of the nervous system.
In consequence, "sexual storms" result in neuropaths, whether the
neuropathy be inherited or acquired. Local genital organ irritation leads
to scratching. From this are produced "masturbation storms," which the
subject loathes but cannot control. These occur also from the direct
effects of constipation, as well as from the worms and other parasites
which constipation fosters in the bowel. Teachers, by compelling children
to retain urine through fear of masturbation, often lead to what they
intend to prevent. At the outset masturbation and sexual explosions are
often a physical expression of school strain destitute of moral
significance. They are removable by removing the school strain and its
consequences. If strengthened by protracted existence they intensify
degeneracy due to school strain.
The states of imperfect nutrition, resultant from nerve strains on gland
function, in this way and in others, interfere with the proper evolution
of puberty and the involutional changes at the "change of life," which
occurs in both sexes. The conditions of "nervous cough," of so-called
"catarrh," and its ally, bronchorrhoea, are often found as expressions of
the systemic exhaustion from school strain, and are treated as purely
local conditions.
School strain, therefore, produces, like all the acquired factors of
degeneracy, a systemic nervous exhaustion which may be expressed either in
general neuropathy or hysteria after puberty, or in the tropho-neuroses,
like gout and allied states, or in epilepsy or arterial change,
predisposing to rupture of arteries at periods of stress, with resultant
convulsions and paralysis.
CHAPTER X
THE DEGENERATE CRANIUM
The cranium or skull is a development in part of the vertebræ or bones
forming the backbone, and in part of dermal or membranous bones, which of
old in reptiles, as in the alligator to-day, formed the protective armour
of the skin of the head. As the head end of the spinal cord of the
lancelet developed, the cartilage enclosing it developed to protect it.
This was the earlier evolution. Later, another skull developed in
connection with this. The cranium or skull therefore has, as Minot
remarks,[188] a double origin, or, rather, there are two skulls which were
originally distinct. In evolution from the lowest fish to the highest
mammal, and in the embryonic development of man, these become united.
The primary skull, as already stated, is practically an extension of the
vertebræ, which send side outgrowths to cover the brain as the backbone
covers the spinal cord. This primary skull extended in front of the
notochord (the spinal cord of the human embryo, and the permanent spinal
cord of the lancelet), where it gave off two trabeculæ cranii or front
skull plates. Behind, the primary skull or chondrocranium gives off two
occipal or rear skull plates. It gives off also two plates midway between
the trabeculæ and occipitals, which, as they gradually enclose the
primitive hearing apparatus, the otocysts (permanent in fish, and
embryonic in man), are called periotic capsules. This primary skull is at
first cartilaginous, as in sharks. With the increase in the size of the
brain in evolution and in human embryology, this cartilaginous primary
skull became insufficient to roof over the brain, and thus resulted gaps
in it. The fontanelles, or soft places at the top, sides, and back of the
head of the new-born child, are the remains of this failure of the
chondrocranium, or primary skull, to cover the gains of the nervous system
in the struggle for existence. This deficiency, resultant on advance in
evolution, would have been a long-standing serious block to further
advance, were it not that the skin of the mammal retained a function
inherited from the reptiles and bony fish.
These cavities were filled by dermal bones, which, at first serving merely
as armour in the skin of the head, came to be protectors of the nervous
system. The following bones represent these dermal bones in the embryonic
human skull: The frontals, which form the chief part of the forehead; the
sutures, or dovetails, of these normally disappear in the adult, so that
the forehead seems to be but one bone. This union may not occur (Fig. 7),
as in the case of the philosopher Kant, who had a frontal suture all his
life. The dovetails are replaced by solid bone, through a process called
synostosis. In the case of the frontal bone it is normal, and in the line
of advance. Elsewhere in the skull it is often an expression of defect
which may give rise to various cranial states which are either absolutely
degenerate in type or degenerate only when occurring in certain races. The
parietals and interparietals are also dermal bones which are united by
synostosis to form the parietals or side bones of the normal adult skull.
The nasal bones which, together with the vomer, form the nose, are
likewise dermal bones, and so are the pterygoids and palatines. The
maxillaries and præmaxillaries, which, with the mandibles, form the jaws,
are dermal bones. The mandibles, however, are in part derived from the
chondrocranium.
[Illustration: FIG. 7.]
With rise in evolution, and during the progress of human embryonic
development, these bones become fewer through their early gristly union or
their synostosis. The openings in the skull resultant on the deficiencies
in the chondrocranium are larger in the sauropsida (birds and reptiles)
than in the ichthyopsida (amphibious and fish); in the monotremata
(egg-laying mammals) than in the sauropsida; in the marsupials (pouched
mammals) than in the monotremata, and in the higher mammals than in the
marsupials. The development of the brain therefore depends on the growing
and expanding power of the secondary skull formed by the dermal bones.
These, considered as bones, are degenerate from the high type of the
vertebræ, and are a mere reminiscence of that outer skeleton whereby early
fish and reptiles emulated the lobster. The influence of any check to
development such as produces degeneracy, is exerted first on the
development of the bone itself, and finally on the relation to other bones
by dovetailing.
In accordance with the general laws governing growth, deficiency in one
place is apt to result in increase elsewhere. The brain-protective
function of the dermal bones being later in development than their old
armour function, is apt to be checked by degeneracy in two ways; in the
first the bone does not grow in size or sufficiently to unite with its
fellows, or this growth occurs only for the benefit of the bone itself,
through Spencer's law of individuation, so that union with the other bones
occurs too early for the benefit of the organism as a whole. To the
factors underlying this is due the non-increase in intellect after puberty
which occurs in the higher apes, and in some of the lower races of men.
These checks also tend to the nutritional benefit of the older primary
skull, whence result the irregularities in development that constitute so
many of the stigmata of the degenerate cranium. The sutures sometimes do
not form because sufficient gristle is not produced to fill the gaps.
(Fig. 8.) These secondary gaps are often filled by new dermal bones called
Wormian. Sometimes this deficiency coexists with too early synostosis
elsewhere.
[Illustration: FIG. 8.]
Degenerate skulls have therefore been divided from the standpoint of these
various unions (by synostosis or otherwise) and non-unions of the sutures,
on the principle that premature synostosis of a suture produces shortness
of the diameter, perpendicular to the direction of the obliterated
suture.[189] The bones stop growing prematurely at the seat of the
synostosis, but the unaffected borders continue growing. The following
types result on this principle:
[Illustration: FIG. 9.]
I. Simple macrocephaly (largeness of head). (_a_) Hydrocephaly (water in
the head. Fig. 9.) (_b_) Kephalones (all heads. Fig. 10), without
hydrocephaly. These two conditions result from the inability of the dermal
bones to fill at the proper period the gaps in the chondrocranium. Neither
of these denotes complete intellectual degeneracy on the one hand, nor
vast intellect on the other. Cuvier was a case of healed-up hydrocephalus,
whence his large brain and skull. In a case of kephalones observed by
Kiernan there was a brain-weight of 68 ounces. The patient was an
imbecile, practically unteachable.[190] Both these conditions denote deep
degeneracy, which, however, may find expression elsewhere than in the
moral sense or intellect.
[Illustration: FIG. 10.]
[Illustration: FIG. 11.]
II. Simple microcephaly (smallness of head. Fig. 11) or nannocephaly
(dwarf head). As a rule these are found among idiots, but much has been
done by training, even for them. Many seemingly great intellects, however,
have heads approaching, if not reaching this type.[191] Des Cartes,
Foscolo, and Schumann had sub-microcephaly. The poet Shelley had a head
belonging very nearly to this category, but while he exhibited many
stigmata of degeneracy, that of intellectual deficiency was wanting. This
type of skull, however, is usually associated with deep degeneracy. It
represents in man the condition underlying the premature suture-closing
which occurs in the ape. It sometimes may exist with considerable
intellect, as in the case of Donizetti. Sometimes this suture-closing
directly prevents brain growth. This condition is rarer than many surgeons
admit, but it does occur, as witness the cases of Vico, Malebranche, and
Clement VI. The fact that these three fractured their skulls in infancy
saved them from being imbeciles and idiots like their brothers, sisters,
and cousins.
[Illustration: FIG. 12.]
III. Dolichocephaly (long-headedness. Fig. 12). (_a_) Upper middle
synostosis. (1) Simple dolichocephaly is due to synostosis of the
sagittal, or antero-posterior suture of the skull. Whether this be due to
degeneracy or not depends entirely on the race in which it occurs. The
ultra-dolichocephaly of Daniel O'Connell was due, in Kiernan's opinion, to
his birth in an Irish district settled by dolichocephalics. Undoubtedly
dolichocephaly is tending to mesocephaly (medium size of head). Even the
negro, generally regarded by ethnologists as dolichocephalic, is tending
in this direction, as numerous observations of my own show.
Dolichocephaly, however, while it does not demonstrate, suggests
degeneracy, since it seems to be a disappearing type of skull. The changes
in American families in this particular indicate this. (2) Sphenocephaly
(wedge-shape of head. Fig. 13) is due to synostosis of the sagittal
suture, with compensatory growth in the region of the large fontanelle.
(_b_) Dolichocephalic states, resulting from inferior lateral synostosis
are: (1) Leptocephaly (narrowness of head), due to synostosis of the
frontal and sphenoid bones. (2) Klinocephaly (saddle-shaped head) is due
to synostosis of the parietal bones with the greater wings of the
sphenoid, or of the parietal with the squamous portion of the temporal
bone.
[Illustration: FIG. 13.]
[Illustration: FIG. 14.]
IV. Brachycephaly (shortness of head. Fig. 14). The pure type like pure
dolichocephaly is not necessarily by itself evidence of degeneracy, as it
may represent race. It is, however, a disappearing type of skull, and
hence should lead to critical examination. In the case of the philosopher
Kant his ultra-brachycephaly could not be charged to race, since he sprang
from dolichocephalic Scotch on one side and dolichocephalic Germans on the
other. (_a_) Posterior stenosis. (1) Pachycephaly (thickness of head) is
due to synostosis of the parietal bone with the occipital. (2) Oxycephaly
(sugar-loaf head) is due to synostosis of the parietal bones and the
occipital with compensatory growth of the region of the anterior
fontanelle; a variety of this is acrocephaly (spire head). (_b_) Upper,
anterior, and lateral synostosis. (1) Platycephaly (flat head. Fig. 15),
or chæmacephaly, is due to extensive synostosis of the temporal bones with
the parietal. Kant, in addition to his cranial stigmata, had this
condition. (2) Trochocephaly (roundness of head) is due to partial
synostosis of the frontals and parietals in the centre of the coronal
suture. (3) Plagiocephaly (wry head. Fig. 16) is due to unilateral
synostosis of the frontal and parietal bones. (_c_) Brachycephaly due to
inferior medium synostosis. Simple brachycephaly is due to early
synostosis of the nasal and sphenoid.
[Illustration: FIG. 15.]
To these should be added kyphocephaly (lump head), due to synostosis of
the posterior part of the squamous portion of the temporal and the
parietal bones with Wormian bones in the lambdoid fissure. Tapeisocephaly
(low head) is due to synostosis of the great wings of the sphenoid with
the frontal. Scaphocephaly (boat-shaped head. Fig. 17) was a term applied
by Von Baer to skulls which are very narrow and compressed at the sides,
and in which there is no trace of the sagittal suture, but its region is
so elevated that the skull cap has the form of a keel boat bottom upward.
Trigonocephaly (triangular head) is a variety of scaphocephaly in which
depression occurs in place of the keel. Sir Walter Scott had a skull in
which premature closure of the sagittal suture produced the appearance of
scaphocephaly, but compensation for this elsewhere produced a decidedly
different type. Scott presented neurotic phenomena during youth, albeit
the brain disease from which he died had anything but a degenerate origin.
[Illustration: FIG. 16.]
[Illustration: FIG. 17.]
Morton and Catlin claim that while the artificial distortions of the
cranium may play a part in developing synostosis these have no effect upon
the intellectual functions. It has been stated further that there are no
mental data to show the effect of artificial malformation of the child's
head during development. Frederick Peterson expresses the opinion that
this practice only exists among the lower races of mankind. In this he is
in decided error, since, as Barnard Davis pointed out many years ago, the
practice is far more widespread than is usually suspected. It was common
all over Europe, was practised by the Turanians, by the Slaves, by the
Scandinavians, Anglo-Saxons, and Celts. Less than half a century ago
Foville[192] proved that the nurses in Normandy were still giving
children's heads a sugar-loaf shape by bandages and a tight cap. In
Britanny they preferred to press it round. In those districts Foville
found that not only congenital cranial irregularities of all types, but
epilepsy, idiocy, and insanity were exceedingly frequent. As customs like
these survive in folklore long after the original superstition which gave
them birth, it is exceedingly probable that such crop out in descendants
of these races to the present day, to confront the anthropologist with
some remarkable crania. Tylor[193] is of opinion that without respecting
the repressive action of the Government, the Bretons and Normans secretly
continue this practice. Despite the labours of Foville these people openly
defied the Government for ten years.
Certain conditions of the occiput have been described as associated with
degeneracy. As Obici[194] and Dei Vecchio[195] have shown, the occipital
condyle, in man normally convex, abnormally varies between two extremes,
the flat and angular condyles. The flat condyle indicates a degenerative
type. In the angular condyle the anterior face is derived from that
portion of the basi-occipital nucleus that normally takes part in the
formation of the anterior condyle region; the posterior face forms the
embryonal germ of the occipital.
The occipital of the adult is the final outcome of the fusion of an
uncertain number of vertebræ. The occipital bone in man is practically
made up of five bones, union between which does not occur completely until
the fifth or sixth year. The deficiencies in the chondrocranium appear in
the occipital bone, which requires a small portion of the dermal bone to
complete it on each side.
The variability of the occipital bone which, as just shown, is so
frequently associated with all forms of degeneracy, is still better
understood when we remember that it is of vertebral character. The
investing mass of the head and of the notochord is the skeleton of the
occipital bone. Between this skeleton and the pituitary body the important
portion of the brain formed by the occipital lobes takes its origin. As
these lobes are practically, as Spitzka has shown, the great centres of
sense and other inter-associations it is not astonishing that their
imperfect development should be accompanied by changes in the occipital
bone. As Crochley Clapham, Mickle, and Spitzka have shown, a flat occiput
is common in imbecility and moral insanity. It has been found quite
frequently in "reasoning maniacs" by Campagne. The proper development of
the occiput influences the proper development of association tracts which
serve as a balance wheel to the individual. The proper development of the
occipital bone is, moreover, connected with the proper development of the
two last vertebræ, which like it are losing their vertebral
characteristics.
CHAPTER XI
THE DEGENERATE FACE AND NOSE
The development of the face depends, as I have already shown, upon the
enlargement and fusion of the mouth and nose cavities, and upon the later
partial separation of the nose and mouth and the nose cavities, leaving
the posterior nose open. It depends further upon the growth and
specialisation of the face region, of which the elongation is the most
prominent indication, and finally upon the development of a prominent
external nose. The relations of face to cranium in embryology have already
been described. When the medullary tube of the notochord enlarges to form
the brain the end of the head bends over to make room for that
enlargement. The bending of the head carries the mouth plate, which is to
be the mouth, over to the front of the head. The changes which develop the
mouth cavity are the growth of the brain and the increase in size of the
heart cavity, which expand to the front, leaving the mouth cavity between
them. The mouth cavity represents two gill-slits united in the front line.
The nose is formed from two olfactory plates situated just in front of the
mouth and in contact with the fore-brain. These olfactory plates grow in
size by the increase of tissue, and the resulting pits pass away from the
brain. At first these pits, although widely separated by what is called
the nasal process, communicate freely with the mouth. The nasal process
includes the origin of the future nose and of the future intermaxillary
region of the upper lip.
The human face is modified backward from the vertebrate type. It is an
additional illustration of the degeneracy of a series of related
structures for the benefit of the organism as a whole. The progress of
development of the face in the vertebrates is checked in man. First, as
Minot remarks,[196] because the upright position renders it unnecessary to
bend the head as in quadrupeds. Second, because the enormous cerebral
development has rendered an enlargement of the brain cavity necessary.
This has taken place by extending the cavity over the nose region as well
as by enlarging the whole skull. Third, because the development of the
face is arrested at an embryonic stage; the production of a long snout
being really an advance of development which does not take place in man.
From what has been said of the relations of the dermal bones to the nose
and face in the chapter on the skull, it will be obvious that these must
follow the same laws as to degeneracy as the skull itself. These checks
from degeneracy in arrest of development are apt to affect most obviously
the unilateral development of the face. From this results the exaggerated
asymmetry so frequently observed.
Jacob Baumler, the founder of the Zoar community of the United States, a
religious fanatic, had a very marked asymmetry of the face and the mind
of a degenerate. His orbits were unequal, one being exceedingly large and
the other correspondingly small.
The human face at birth is so near that of the monkeys that if only the
heads of both were exposed to view at birth it would be difficult for a
casual observer to distinguish one from the other. Cope[197] has made the
following classification of the head and face for comparative study: The
relative size of the cerebral to the facial regions, the prominence of the
forehead, the prominence of the superciliary regions, the prominence of
the alveolar borders of the jaws, the prominence and width of the chin,
the relation of length to width of the skull, the prominence of the
cheek-bones, the form of the nose, the relative size of the orbits and
eyes, the size of the mouth and lips.
At birth in the infant ape the facial region of the skull is smaller than
in the adult, the forehead is more prominent, the superciliary ridges are
more prominent, the edges of the jaws are more prominent, the chin is
less, while the cheek-bones are more prominent, the nose is without a
bridge and has short and flat cartilages, the face is flattened, the
orbits and eyes are smaller and closer together, the mouth is small and
the lips thin.
In the typical infant child as he begins to develop the cerebral part of
the skull predominates over the facial more than in the adult, the
superciliary ridges are not developed, the alveolar borders are not
prominent, the cheek-bones are not prominent, the nose is without a bridge
and the cartilages are flat and generally short, the eyes are larger. In
this last particular the human infant resembles the lemurs and thus
retains an embryonic tendency. In some degenerates this tendency remains
unchecked, and the result is unusually large orbits as in Fig. 18. In
other instances the human foetus passes through this lemurian stage to
reach and even exceed the anthropoid in smallness and closeness together.
[Illustration: FIG. 18.]
In determining a standard by which to measure the face two principles come
into play: the general principle of evolution, and also that æsthetic
principle governing profile, which has practically obtained supremacy,
after long struggles for existence, from the Egyptian period of the first
dynasty until its final acceptance by the Greeks, as shown, for instance,
in the Apollo Belvedere. Indeed, so nearly does the modern standard
approximate to the Greek, that Kingsley,[198] speaking of modern profiles,
remarks that if he were to describe the American type he should be as much
inclined to give that name to the form of features of the Apollo Belvedere
as any other, since it is quite universal, distinctive, and possesses the
same elements of beauty.
[Illustration: FIG. 19.]
Among Aryan-speaking races this type would be accepted as the ideal one.
Since each nationality, and peoples of the same nationality, living in
different countries do not possess exactly the same type of face, the
general presumption of evolution as modifying notions of beauty must also
be taken into consideration. In the determination of the extent to which
the profile exists the facial angle plays a part. This angle was early
pointed out by Camper as a means of distinguishing the relative
development of the skull and face. "The basis on which a distinction of
nationality is founded," said Camper, "may be displayed by two straight
lines (Fig. 19), one of which is to be drawn through the meatus auditorius
to the base of the nose, and the other touching the prominent centre of
the forehead and falling thence on the most advancing portion of the upper
jaw, the head being used in profile. In the angle produced in these two
lines may be said to consist not only the distinctions between the skulls
of different species of animals, but also those which are found to exist
between different races. The angle which the facial line or characteristic
line of the visage makes varies from 70° to 80° in the race. All who raise
it higher disobey the rules of art (from imitation of the antique). All
who bring it lower fall into the likeness of the monkeys. If I cause the
facial line to fall in front I have the antique head. If I incline it
backward I have the head of a negro. If I incline it still further I have
the head of a monkey; inclined still more I have the head of a dog; and,
lastly, that of a goose."
[Illustration: FIG. 20.]
[Illustration: FIG. 21. COLOURED CRIMINAL YOUTH.]
This is excellently shown by the following illustrations. Fig. 20 is the
head of Johanna, the female chimpanzee of Central Park, New York City.
This head has (by Camper's method) an angle between 40° and 50°. The brain
of this animal occupies one-third of the skull, and the jaws two-thirds.
The negro criminal (Fig. 21) has an angle of about 70°. Here the brain is
encroaching, while the jaws are receding. The Caucasic race (Fig. 22) has
an angle of 75° to 80°. In many cases the frontal development of the
brain and resultant recession of the jaws produce an angle of 90°, with a
general result not unlike the Apollo.
Although the general outlines of facial evolution as sighted by Camper are
in accord with my own views, yet, as regards accuracy, this angle is not
an ideal from whence to study face degeneracy, since the line does not
fall low enough to include the chin, and also, as I have elsewhere shown,
in the degenerate, the ear varies as much as one to one and one-half
inches upon heads of different individuals. Frequently, in the degenerate
classes, the ears of the same individual differ as much as one inch in
height.
[Illustration: FIG. 22.]
An ideal line, from whence to study a degenerate face, should be drawn
perpendicularly from the supra-orbital ridge intersecting the upper and
lower jaw and chin. While the chin of the Apollo Belvedere falls slightly
inside of this line, yet this is hardly perceptible. Having now fixed a
standard from which to study the degenerate face, it should be remembered
that jaws which protrude beyond this line are atavistic, and those which
recede are even more degenerate.
[Illustration: FIG. 23.]
[Illustration: FIG. 24.]
The angle between 80° and 90° may be accepted as an ideal by which to
study degeneracy. This factor alone, however, can not be accepted: the
evolution of the face itself must be also taken into consideration. It is
obvious that in the struggle for existence and supremacy between the brain
and the face (both expressions of vertebrate advance), stress may be
concentrated on one particular part. Whence result certain factors which
modify the conclusion to be drawn from the facial angle. The hollowed out
condition of the face from the supra-orbital ridges down to and including
the base of the nose (illustrated in Johanna) merits attention here. The
same condition is observable in the negro, only it extends farther down
and includes both jaws. One jaw, however, may alone be affected. Most of
the Chinese, Japanese, Eskimo, Polynesians, Australians, Aryan Caucasic
Africans, and some American Indians, possess this feature. As has been
already remarked, the facial regions of man and the ape up to a certain
point are similar. Not until the sense organs of man begin to develop are
changes noticeable in facial expression. If, through heredity or
constitutional defect, that part of the brain which presides over
development of the facial bones lose its control, arrest of development of
that particular tissue results at any period between birth and the
twenty-fifth year, while other parts of the head and face continue to
develop. With this understanding Camper's method can be safely applied to
certain cases. If a line be dropped from the supra-orbital ridge to the
upper lip in its most prominent part (Fig. 23), it will be found here that
in place of the face presenting the full appearance illustrated in Fig. 19
and Fig. 22, it has the hollow appearance observable in Johanna and in
Fig. 25. This is due to arrest of development of the bones of the face and
the upper jaw. The extent of depression depends upon the time of arrest,
the frontal development of the skull, and the position of the upper jaw.
The nose may present and retain the appearance of that of a child six
months old, or any other shape up to normal development, but will not
protrude from the face nor present a normal symmetrical appearance. It has
the appearance of having been driven into the face. It has been claimed
that the bridge of the nose is pushed out by the advancing brain and
cranium. This may be true to a certain extent, but one is not necessarily
dependent on the other, since an arrested nose is frequently found in a
fully developed cranium (Fig. 24), which is not unlike Fig. 23 and a
"throw-back" to Fig. 20. This is due to the fact that in the struggle for
existence the bones of the face and skull base became arrested early in
life, while the brain and cranium continued to advance. The lower jaw is
usually normal since, while the tendency to arrest may be present in a
slight degree, mobility of the jaw often causes such increased nutrition
of the part that normal development in many cases thereby results.
Overlooking this fact has often led to the assertion that a large lower
jaw exists when, in reality, this appearance is due to an arrest of the
face and upper jaw, the lower remaining normal. The expression of
degeneracy is rather in the arrest of the upper jaw than in the normal
lower (see Fig. 23).
The criminals of the Elmira Reformatory, and those of the Pontiac
Reformatory, present marked instances of this stigma, nearly 50 per cent.
being so affected. Arrest of the lower jaw may occur alone, or may be
associated with arrest of development of the face (Fig. 25). When this is
the case a deep, broad groove extends from below the eyes downward and
backward to the lower jaw, also showing a lateral arrest of development,
producing a hatchet-shaped face. The upper part of the face may be normal,
and the lower jaw arrested antero-posteriorly.
[Illustration: FIG. 25.]
[Illustration: FIG. 26.]
It has been broadly asserted that this is an atavism, but more probably it
is an expression of that phase of evolution whereby both jaws are becoming
subservient to the advance in evolution represented by the gains of the
brain and cranium. When both jaws are arrested Camper's disobedience of
the rules of art, whereby the facial angle is increased over 90°, occurs.
This condition has been found in many degenerates. Almost invariably in
connection with the arrest of development of the face occurs arrest of the
bones of the nose. The diameter of the nasal cavities is much smaller
than normal. Owing to the unstable condition of the nervous system there
is also hypertrophy of the turbinate bone and mucous membrane of the nose
and throat, tonsil hypertrophy, arrested development of the chest walls
and lung tissue, and unstable mucous membranes throughout the lungs. Such
a degenerate face, body, and unstable nervous system is a fruitful soil
for the germs of tuberculosis. In these cases even a casual glance will
show that the two halves of the face and head are not symmetrically
developed. It looks as though the two halves were made separately and
joined together, one half higher than the other. This condition is
excellently illustrated in Fig. 26. In this case the left half is higher
than the right. (Frequently the right side is the higher.) There is arrest
of the upper and lower jaw. The left corner of the mouth is higher than
the right. The left half of the lower jaw is higher than the right, the
body of the lower jaw is longer, the ramus is shorter. The left eye and
ear are higher. The left supra-orbital ridge is higher. The ears stand
almost at right angles, while the malar processes are quite prominent.
Viewing the face from a three-quarters' angle (which should always be done
in making an examination, or photographing the degenerate face for study)
it will be found that there is not only arrest of development of the bones
of the face, but also of the lower jaw.
As already stated in the chapter on the cranium, the nasal bones belong to
the dermal category, their special function as nose bones being a later
acquisition. In their acquirement of this function they have passed
through many changes, especially as the human face in its nasal features
has assumed an embryonic type. In consequence, like all late embryonic
acquisitions, degeneracy is apt to involve the nose.
When arrest of development of the face takes place stigmata of the nasal
bones always result. Under such conditions narrowing or arrest of
development of the entire nasal cavity ensues.
Deformities of the nasal septum, deflection, hypertrophy and atrophy of
the turbinate bones, deformities of the maxillary sinus, hypertrophy of
the mucous membrane and polypi are common. Deflection of the external nose
is a very common stigma of degeneracy. Not only is the septum involved,
but also the outer plates of the nasal cavity. So unstable are the bones
of the face in their development that it is not an uncommon thing for the
nasal process of the upper jaw on one side to be much more developed than
the other. Not only is the nasal septum involved, but also the bones of
the face as well, producing a fulness on the long side of the face. This
stigma is very common among criminal youth. In such cases the deflected
septum is due to the development of the outer plate and not _vice versâ_.
Deflection of the septum to the left may entirely obliterate (as in Fig.
27) the left nasal cavity. If one nostril of a rabbit be permanently
closed, after the animal has attained its full growth, the nasal cavity of
the affected side remains undeveloped and facial asymmetry results.
[Illustration: FIG. 27.]
Therefore two factors are common: first, the arrest of development of the
bones of the nose, and second, the clogging of the cavity, both active
agents in producing a closure, resulting in mouth-breathing.
Coexisting with these is often (as in Fig. 27) smallness of the upper
jaw. In the same connection grooved teeth occur, as in the same
illustration.
[Illustration: FIG. 28.]
The turbinated (Fig. 28) bones are often hypertrophied, as is also the
nasal septum (vomer or dividing bone) and the mucous membrane. This
results from the general instability of the nervous system with its
special expression in increased blood supply, whence occur overgrowth in
and imperfect work by the mucous membrane, causing mouth-breathing and
polypi, which again increase this defect. All these predispose to germ
invasion.
In the figure are also shown grooves upon the teeth. Sufficient symptoms
are here evident to stamp this as a marked degenerate skull.
Hypertrophy of the turbinate bones, septum, and mucous membrane, as it
occurs among degenerates, appears in Fig. 29, and is due, first, to an
unstable nervous system, and, second, a larger system of blood vessels
which ramify through these parts. Stimulation, together with the stenosis
(narrowing), tend to produce a closure. Still further, irritation and an
unstable mucous membrane results, with polypi or adenoid vegetation
following.
[Illustration: FIG. 29.]
Not only do deflection of septum and hypertrophy of the nasal bones occur,
but the antrum (cavity behind the nose) may be almost entirely
obliterated, while the upper jaw is arrested (Fig. 29). The antrum may be
entirely wanting, as in Fig. 30; so unstable may these tissues develop
that the nasal cavities may become almost entirely obliterated, as
observed in this figure.
[Illustration: FIG. 30.]
These conditions are due to the unstable structure and large nerve and
blood supply. Perhaps one of the most interesting points in connection
with degeneracy of the nose is the fact that in most cases the structures
are either arrested or excessively developed, to the extent of the entire
absence of the inferior turbinate bone. This was the case in a girl
thirteen years of age who died of tuberculosis. Her skull revealed many
other forms of degeneracy as well. The deviation in the development of the
two nasal cavities results from the excessive and arrested development of
the turbinates, thus preventing inhalation and exhalation of air, the free
side developing and the closed side remaining undeveloped. In such case
the nose is deflected to the right or left, depending on which side is
arrested. When both nostrils are closed the nose becomes thin and pointed
and mouth-breathing results. In degenerate nasal cavities polypi (tumours)
are apt to occur.
Persons with long, thin noses, arrested nasal cavities, sunken faces (as a
result mouth-breathers), and with contracted chest walls are the subjects
for tuberculosis. In such cases, especially when the nervous system is
unstable, the different forms of catarrh are present. This condition
worries the youth under the strain of puberty. To the catarrh which is
merely a result is ascribed his constitutional defects. These somatic
signs are quite noticeable in most of these cases, and by early
recognition proper treatment, with change of climate, frequently prolongs
life for years.
The so-called erectile tissue of the nose (containing blood whose flow is
checked through spasm to increase sensation), that relic of a time when
smell played a greater part among the senses, is apt to be affected by
degeneracy either as to its excessive or imperfect development. From this
comes the bleeding of the nose, so frequently an expression of nerve
strain at puberty, which may take the place of menstruation. It is to be
noted that while true hæmophilia ("bleeder" tendency) occurs chiefly in
boys, epistaxis shows itself very frequently in their sisters. A
remarkable illustration of this was reported by Dr. Delia E. Howe,[199] of
the Fort Wayne (Indiana) School for the Feeble-minded. In cases of
so-called male menstruation[200] the symptom is apt to be epistaxis.
The irregularity in blood supply predisposes the nose to attacks on its
structure from pathogenic germs. Hay fever is an expression of nervous
instability of these structures, and is especially apt to occur in
neurasthenics, hysterics, and degenerates.
CHAPTER XII
DEGENERACY OF THE LIP, PALATE, EYE, AND EAR
Each part or sense organ may, independently of the face as a whole,
exhibit signs of degeneracy. The palate, lip, nose, eye, and ear have
their own expressions of degeneracy. The palate, so far as the joining of
its two parts is concerned, resists degeneracy to a remarkable degree. The
cleft, which results from non-union, is usually an expression of general
degeneracy acted on by its nutritive expression, albeit cleft-palate may
be associated with the graver degeneracies like idiocy.
As the subjects of the deeper degeneracies associated with cleft-palate
usually perish in early infancy, the nutritive degeneracies are most
frequently found associated with cleft-palate in adult life. The mouth in
the vertebrates does not agree in character with the invertebrate mouth.
The mouth has grown in proportion to evolution in the lower vertebrates.
It is larger, however, in proportion in the human embryo than in the
adult. In this it agrees with the general lower type of the human face.
The human chin is at first retreating, and does not become distinctly
prominent until the fifth month of foetal life. The nose separates from
the mouth toward the end of the second month. It is at first short and
broad and resembles at three months the type of some of the lower negro
races. When the nose is separated from the mouth a partition forms between
the cavities of the nose and the mouth, later supplemented by the true
palate, which divides the mouth into an upper respiratory passage and a
lower digestive passage. This palate is partly composed of bone and partly
of flesh. The fleshy part ends in what is called the uvula. This is very
subject to abnormalities, as has been pointed out by C. L. Dana; it is a
very frequent mark of degeneracy. Dickens noticed the uvular tone of voice
in young thieves, due to deformity of the uvula.
Cleft palates are comparatively rare in proportion to other forms of
nutritive degeneracy. Palatal embryology casts light on the causation. At
a very early period of foetal life a series of clefts appear on each side
of the cephalic extremity, separated by rods of tissue called branchial
arches. The clefts communicate with the alimentary canal. These various
clefts have usually coalesced about the ninth and tenth week of foetal
life, but occasionally this coalescence fails or is incomplete. This leads
to various deformities, the chief of which are cleft palate and hare-lip.
Cleft palate has been known to affect several members of the same family,
and to occur in the offspring of the affected members. There are instances
of the transmission of this deformity from an affected pug-bitch to her
offspring. If it were possible to practise selective breeding in man as in
dogs a race of men with hare-lips and cleft palates could probably be
produced.[201]
[Illustration: FIG. 31.]
Cleft palate may be divided into two classes, congenital and acquired,
acquired cleft palate being the result of disease either inherited or
acquired, but only affecting the part after birth. Congenital cleft palate
is divisible into two kinds, complete and partial; complete when the
fissure extends the entire length, from the uvula to and including the
anterior alveolar process and even the lips (Fig. 31), partial when only a
small part of the structure is involved. Thus the cleft may extend through
the anterior alveolar process, involving the incisive bone only, which is
very rare; when present single or double hare-lip almost invariably
coexists. I have observed in practice six cases where a small portion of
the interior alveolar process was involved, with the jaw and one or two
teeth. The hard palate only may be involved to the extent of a small
fissure, or the whole palate may be wanting. The soft palate only may
contain the cleft, or simply the uvula. Cases are on record in which the
non-development of the intermaxillary bones produces fissures in the lip.
_A priori_, cleft palate is an evident expression of hereditary defect.
Langdon Down found a constant relation between brain deformity, cleft
palate, and deformed vaults.
In a case cited elsewhere,[202] three members of one family had cleft
palate; one 17 years old, the other 30, and the third 35. The first and
last are women, the other a married man with a family, who have no trace
of the father's deformity. In these cases no instance of cleft palate
could be found either among the ancestors or the collateral branches of
the family.
Another family has a remarkable history. G. H. C., born 1853, perfect; L.
C., born 1855, single hare-lip and cleft palate; J. F. C., born 1856,
perfect; F. W. C., born 1860, double hare-lip and cleft palate; H. E. C.,
born 1868, perfect. The paternal grandmother also had cleft palate.
Knecht found that 5 per cent. of 1,200 criminals examined had cleft
palate. Fourteen per cent. of the prostitutes examined by Pauline
Tarnowsky had cleft palates. Langdon Down, among congenital idiots, found
only a half per cent. of cleft palates. Grenzer found only nine cases in
14,466 children, or one in 1,607. I examined 1,977 feeble-minded children
without finding a single case. In 207 blind only one case was observed. In
1,235 deaf mutes two cases were found. The percentage among the defective
classes, while not large, is, undoubtedly, much larger than among normal
individuals.
A keeper of the Zoological Gardens in Philadelphia observed cleft palate
in the mouths of lion cubs born in the gardens. Cleft palates were also
observed in a number of pups born in Buffalo. Dr. Ogle found that 99 per
cent. of the lion cubs born in the London Zoological Gardens had cleft
palates. He claims that this is due to the artificial diet, as the result
of enforced captivity. Similar results observed in other gardens in Europe
are charged to feeding the mothers with meat without bone, as feeding with
the whole carcass of small animals greatly diminished these deformities.
It would seem that if cleft palate is due to this cause other bony
structures should also be involved, and, as a matter of fact, many of the
lions born in captivity are rickety. Cleft palate has been observed among
dogs, sheep, goats, &c. The question, therefore, whether domesticity here
does not play the alleged part of civilisation in man can be solved only
by a knowledge of the frequency of the condition among wild animals of the
same genus. It is evident that, in dealing with the question of ætiology,
the influence of shock on the mother's nervous system cannot be excluded
in the cases charged to feeding.
It should be remembered that cleft palate is a factor which predisposes to
death by infectious diseases whose local manifestations are in the mouth
and throat; hence the majority of the degenerates in whom cleft palate
occurs are liable to die before the completion of their fifth year.
Hare-lip (Fig. 32) is an exceedingly hereditary disorder, as Murray,
Demarquay, Trélat, Hutchinson, Féré, Marsh, Lucas, Ireland, and others
have shown. It occurs with great frequency in almost all forms of
degeneracy. Kiernan, of Chicago, has found that 5 per cent. of the
hereditary lunatics in that city and in New York City have hare-lip.
[Illustration: FIG. 32.]
How far degeneracy may turn back the page of evolution is excellently
illustrated in the cyclopian descendants of degenerate families elsewhere
cited from Kiernan, of Chicago. While there is a seeming conflict as to
the primitive eye type of vertebrates between morphologists represented by
Howard Ayres[203] (who claims that the eyes were derived from the median
eye of the ascidian lancelet) and Semper[204] (who is of the opinion that
the existing vertebrate eyes represent the paired eyes of a hypothetical
annelid precursor); still both opinions are fully reconcilable through the
results of study of the ascidian and lancelet eye collated with cyclopian
and triophthalmic (three-eyed) degeneracies in man, the human eye and the
third eye of reptiles like the hatteria of New Zealand. The eye of the
ascidian tadpole agrees fundamentally with the type of eye peculiar to the
vertebrates in that the retina is derived from the wall of the brain. On
this account it is called a myolonic eye. In the typical invertebrate eye,
on the contrary, the retinal cells are differentiated from the external
ectoderm.
The ascidian eye, however, differs, as Osborn[205] remarks, essentially
from the paired eyes of the craniate (skulled) vertebrates in that the
lens as well as the retina is derived from the wall of the brain. The lens
of the lateral eye of the vertebrates is derived by an invagination of the
ectoderm, which meets and fits in the retinal cup at the end of the optic
vesicle. The ascidian eye, however, agrees in respect to the origin of its
lens with the parietal or pineal eye of the lizard, in which the lens is
likewise derived from cells which form part of the wall of the cerebral
outgrowth which gives rise to the pineal body.
The pineal body is another of those remarkable rudimentary structures
whose constant presence in all groups of vertebrates forms such an
eminently characteristic median outgrowth from the dorsal wall of the
brain (thalamencephalon), the distal extremity of which dilates into a
vesicle and becomes separated from the proximal portion. The distal
vesicle becomes entirely constricted off from the primary epiphysial
(pineal) outgrowth of the brain, and the parietal nerve does not represent
the primitive connection of the pineal eye with the roof of the brain, but
arises quite independently of the proximal portion of the epiphysis.
The remote ancestors of the vertebrates possessed a median, unpaired,
myolonic eye, which was subsequently replaced in function by the evolution
of the paired eyes. The cyclopic condition occurs very frequently among
human monstrosities, much more frequently than among animals, Hannover
claims,[206] but this is clearly due to the fact that human monstrosities
are much more frequently recorded. Of the 120 cases I have been able to
collect from literature, 56 presented other evidences of degeneracy than
cyclopic conditions, and 60 had neuropathic or other taint in the
ancestry. Dareste[207] has shown that the production of a single eye, the
changes in the structure of the mouth, the atrophy and abnormal situation
of the olfactory apparatus and of the vesicle of the hemispheres, all
result from an arrest of development. The determining influence must be
exerted very early in the life history of the embryo.
[Illustration: FIG. 33.]
Hannover points out that there often is coincident hydrocephalus and
harelip, imperfect genital development, and allied arrest of development.
J. R. Folsom, of Cecil, Georgia, has reported a female, born alive to a
negro multipara, who died two hours after birth. The eye was centrally
located in the forehead, on a line with the nose. The brow was a complete
arch, as was the upper eyelid. The lower lid had a mark midway, indicating
an attempt at division. The nasal bones were wanting, but the soft part of
the nose, destitute of the orifice, hung over the mouth, which was
completely covered. The chin was recedent. C. Phisalix described a case in
which the nose was wanting. Its place in the median was occupied by a
single eye; on the horizontal diameter were two pupils separated by a
narrow space. Landolt, discussing a case reported by Valude, points out
that in cyclopic eyes all the parts may be double or united in every
degree except that there is never a single lens or double vitreous. Bock
and others, however, describe cases in which the eye has not been formed
by the conglomeration of two separately developed eyes, but it is a single
developed eye; the other being wanting entirely. Bruce reports a cyclop
in which there was a single socket for the eye of a lozenge-shape,
situated in the lower middle of the forehead. The socket was furnished
with two pairs of eyelids, upper and lower. The eye was found to consist
of two rudimentary eyes, with two rudimentary retinæ, apparently springing
from a single optic vesicle. The nose was represented by a short process
attached to the forehead, above the median eye.
[Illustration: FIG. 34.]
The cyclops illustrated (Figs. 33, 34) was born to a 17-year old
neuropathic primipara, after a protracted labour. The child was living,
but was killed by pressure on the funis. The mouth contained an ivory,
tusk-like tooth at each corner. There was mane-like hair around the neck.
Cyclopia is very frequently associated with the absence of both the
internal and external ear, and with synotia (joined ears).
In triophthalmic cases the three eyes are usually separate, two occupying
the usual position, while the third is situated as illustrated in the case
cited. Ninety families of degenerates, averaging eleven children each, had
five cases of cyclops.
Degeneracy, which affects so deeply the development of the eye, naturally
tends to evince itself in other anomalous states in the organ. As
excessive asymmetry of the body is one of the most noticeable of the
stigmata of degeneracy, it is not astonishing to find that this asymmetry
expresses itself both in the position as well as in the size and structure
of the eye. As Kiernan[208] pointed out, twenty years ago, asymmetrical
irides are exceedingly frequent in the types of insanity due to hereditary
defect. This observation has since been confirmed by Féré,[209] not only
as to the insane, but as to other classes of the degenerate. The
conditions of the eye known as microphthalmia (small eye), macrophthalmia
(big eyes) and anophthalmia (absence of eyes), are found quite frequent in
degenerate families. Very frequently the pupil of the eye is asymmetrical.
This was pointed out by Kiernan in the case of Guiteau. Corectopia
(displacement of the pupil so that it is not in the centre of the iris)
often exists. Coloboma (eye fissure) is also not infrequent among the
degenerate. These vary greatly in situation and general results. The iris
is sometimes completely absent on one or both sides. Beside the anomalies,
diseased conditions like retinitis pigmentosa, congenital cataract and the
macular degeneracy cited by C. P. Pinckard,[210] of Chicago, are far from
infrequent expressions of degenerate taint in the eye; the organ in this
particular obeying the general law that degeneracy may show itself in the
minute change resulting in disturbance of function or in that producing
disease, or, finally, in atavism. The defects of the eyes requiring
glasses are exceedingly frequent in degenerates, and often aggravate their
morbidity. Here, as in the case of the teeth, the chief factor is often
ignored.
The external ear is, of all organs, that most affected by degeneracy.[211]
It is a cartilaginous organ extending from a bony base, without a bony
framework for its support and with very deficient blood supply, on account
of its distances from the great blood centres, so that any defect in the
nerve centres which control the local blood supply is likely to affect its
nutrition. As a cartilaginous organ it has no lymphatics, which of
necessity affects its growth. The sensitiveness of the ear to vasomotor
changes is evident by the results of the extremes in heat and cold,
emotional blushing and fatigue. Galton reports a schoolmistress who judges
the fatigue of her pupils by the condition of their ears. If the ears be
white, flabby and pendant, she concludes that the children are much
fatigued. If they be relaxed, but red, they are suffering, not from
overwork, but from a struggle with the nervous system rarely under control
in children. These states are very common among degenerates.
To appreciate the degeneracy observed in the ear its embryology requires
study. Before the end of the first month[212] there appears around the
external opening of the first gill-cleft (Fig. 35) a series of six
tubercles, two in front on the hind edge of the first visceral arch, one
above the cleft and three behind it (Fig. 36). A little later a vertical
furrow appears down the middle of the hyoid arch, in such a way as to mark
off a little ridge which joins on to tubercle 3 and descends behind
tubercles 4 and 5. The second stage is reached by the growth of all the
parts; the fusion of tubercles 2 and 3 and the growth of the ridge down
behind tubercle 5 to become continuous with 6. After these changes it is
not difficult to identify the parts.
[Illustration: FIG. 35.]
[Illustration: FIG. 36.]
Tubercle No. 1 is the tragus; 2 and 3, together with the arching ridge,
represent the helix; 4, the anti-helix; 5, the anti-tragus; and 6, the
lobule; the pit between the tubercles the fossa angularis. During the
latter part of the second month the ear changes in its proportion somewhat
in the irregular development. The third stage begins at the third month.
The upper and posterior part of the concha arises from the surface of the
head, and gradually but rapidly bends forward so as to completely cover
the anti-helix and the upper portion of the fossa angularis. During this
stage in mammals the assumption of the pointed form of the ear commences.
The fourth stage begins at the fourth month, when the tubercles, which are
now joined together by cartilages, commence to unfold and are completed by
the fifth month. Finally, the sixth tubercle develops to form the lobule.
This unfolding or development of the tubercles to produce the different
portions of the ear and make it complete is not unlike the development of
a flower from the bud. By this process may be understood how if, by
malnutrition in one tubercle or bud, or should there be a larger supply of
nutriment in one than another, malformation of the ear would result. If
arrest of development of all the tubercles should take place at any
period, from the first to the fifth month of foetal life, the ear would
resemble a semi-developed flower! (Fig. 37).
[Illustration: FIG. 37.]
[Illustration: FIG. 38.]
As in other cases, it is necessary to fix an approximately normal standard
for the ear from the standpoint of man's status in evolution. The ear
grows more or less through life, but, like the skeleton, practically
reaches its full development about the twenty-sixth year. That this is not
always the case, however, is demonstrated by the results of the
examination of 546 persons. In an examination of 63 children between 6 and
18 months old the ears measured from 1·60 to 2·12, the average being 1·90
inches; in width from ·75 to 1, with an average of ·96. In 127 children
from 8 to 12 years old the ear measured from 1·95 to 2·32 inches, the
average being 2·19; width ·81 to 1·50, the average being 1·06. In 356
persons between 12 and 50 years old the shortest ear was 2, the longest 3,
the average 2·50; width, smallest 1, largest 1·50, the average being 1·22
inches. The normal ear, or rather the ideal one (for few persons possess
it in its entirety), should have a gracefully curved outline, be nowhere
pointed or irregular, have a well-defined helix, separated from the
anti-helix by a distinct scaphoid fossa extending down nearly to the level
of the anti-tragus (Fig. 38). Its root should be lost in the concha before
reaching the anti-helix. The anti-helix should not be unduly prominent,
and should have a well-marked bifurcation at its superior extremity. The
lobule should be shapely, not adherent, not too pendulous and free from
grooves extending from the scaphoid fossa. The whole should be well
shaped, and its proper proportion and size may be inferred from the table
just given; in the adult it should not average over two and a half inches
in length and one and a quarter in breadth.
The aural deformities that fall under the head of stigmata, or have been
classed as such, affect all portions of the external ear. The helix may be
imperfect, it may be angular, from Darwin's tubercle it may lack its
inward roll, it may be interrupted, the root of the helix may extend
inward completely across the concha, and in very rare instances it may be
bifurcated. The anti-helix may be unduly prominent or be insignificant;
the scaphoid fossa may extend through the lobule or be triple.[213] The
lobule may be adherent and sometimes almost absent, thus producing the
jug-handle-shaped, or so-called Morel ear. It may be exaggerated in size;
the whole ear may be misshapen, too large or too small. These deformities
may exist in nearly every degree, only when pronounced can they be
considered as stigmata. Others have been noted, but their importance as
signs of degeneracy is not very significant unless they co-exist with
several of those above mentioned.
[Illustration: FIG. 39.]
The ears of degenerates frequently grow in later life to an enormous size.
On examination of 207 paupers over 50 years old the shortest ear was found
to be 2·25 inches, the longest 3·36; the average on the right side was
2·73, on the left 2·76; the narrowest ear was ·88, the widest 1·50, the
average 1·26. These results, compared with the results of the measurements
of normal persons from 12 to 50 years, plainly demonstrate that the ears
of degenerates grow after the twenty-sixth year, when the skeleton has
completed its development. With such large ears other stigmata are
generally associated. A few of the best types of stigmata of the ear
illustrate better than any description the general characteristics. Fig.
39 illustrates the ear _par excellence_ of degeneracy, the typical
jug-handled ear first described by Morel and called by his name. This
consists of a long, narrow ear attached its entire length, and tapering
upward and outward from the lobe to the point where the Darwinian tubercle
is located, and there it may take any shape--round, straight, or
pointed--as illustrated in the drawing. The most singular deformity of the
helix is the tubercle of Darwin, which is a little blunt point,
projecting from the inwardly folded margin or helix. When present it is
developed at birth and, according to Ludwig Meyer, more frequent in men
than in women. Fig. 40 shows ear and tubercle taken from Darwin.[214]
These points not only project in toward the centre of the ear, but open a
little outwards (Fig. 41) from its plane, so as to be visible when the
head is viewed from directly in front and behind. They are variable in
size, number and somewhat in position (Fig. 42), standing either a little
higher or lower, and they sometimes occur on one ear and not on the other.
Another marked form of ear degeneracy is one in which the ear is developed
backward at an angle of about 45° (Fig. 43). The general outline of the
ear is fairly good. The anti-helix is much larger than it should be.
Degeneracy usually extends deeply into the organisation of those in whom
this ear is present.
[Illustration: FIG. 40.]
[Illustration: FIG. 41.]
[Illustration: FIG. 42.]
[Illustration: FIG. 43. EAR ALMOST HORIZONTAL AND AT RIGHT ANGLES WITH THE
HEAD.]
[Illustration: FIG. 44. EAR ALMOST ROUND WITH THREE DARWINIAN TUBERCLES AT
INNER BORDER.]
[Illustration: FIG. 45.]
Fig. 44 illustrates noticeable stigmata. The ear stands at right angles
with the head. It is, however, almost as broad as it is long and differs
in shape. The outer helix is excessively developed. The scaphoid fossa
extends through the lobe, which is continuous with the body of the ear and
is not distinct. The root of the helix is excessively developed. There are
three Darwinian tubercles on its border. The anti-tragus is undeveloped.
The tragus is very small and divided into two parts. The auricle-temporal
angle, for functional purposes, should not exceed, according to Buchanan,
30°, or be less than 15°. The difference in this respect is not clear,
since free movement of head and body will readily adjust the auricle to
receive sound. For functional purposes it would seem that the construction
and shape of the ear, especially the anti-helix and concha, would be of
greater importance than its position to the head, since it is necessary to
collect the waves of sound for transmission. From a degeneracy
standpoint, however, the position of the ear is important. Frigerio,[215]
from the examination of several hundred subjects, concludes that the
auricle-temporal angle undergoes a gradual progress from below 90° in
criminals and the insane to above 90° in apes. He found the large angle
very marked in homicides, less so in thieves. There is no question but
that Frigerio is correct in regard to this point. In an examination of the
ears of 465 boy criminals at Pontiac, it was found that 198 were close to
the head, or from 10 to 15°; 152 at an angle of 45°, and 115 at right
angles or 90°. Of 1,041 criminals at Elmira 285 were close, 567 at an
angle of 45°, and 187 at right angles.
[Illustration: FIG. 46.]
[Illustration: FIG. 47.]
[Illustration: FIG. 48.]
[Illustration: FIG. 49.]
Fig. 45 shows the ear which Hawthorne gives Donatello in the _Marble
Faun_; it has been called the "Satanic" ear, because of the pointed
extremities and its narrowness. The helix is rolled upon itself its entire
length, giving the impression of great thickness. The anti-helix is
excessively developed. Figs. 46, 47, 48 (ears of three illegitimate
children at birth) show different stages of development as well as marked
stigmata. Arrest of development occurs between the fourth and fifth month,
owing to the trophic nerve centres being affected by the malnutrition of
the mother. Fig. 49 exhibits the development of a congenital, elephantine
ear in monstrosities. The resemblance to the large ear of the orang and
chimpanzee is very marked.
CHAPTER XIII
THE DEGENERATE TEETH AND JAWS
Next to the ears, the jaws and teeth (as was to be expected from the
variability of these organs in allied animals) are most affected by
degeneracy. This is particularly true of the vertebrates, especially
mammals, as might have been anticipated from their phylogeny. At the head
of the vertebrates is man; at the foot is the lancelet (amphioxus), which
is perhaps most akin to those semi-vertebrates the ascidians, who, in
their larval phase, are higher than when adult, and whose life-history
excellently illustrates that potent phase of evolution, degeneracy.
The lancelet has a spinal cord enclosed in a half-gristly canal (the
notochord). It is practically destitute of a brain. The cerebral vesicle
which represents this is a plain cavity without true subdivision into
ventricles. There is no cranium. The eye (central in position) is a mere
pigment spot with which it is able to distinguish light from darkness. The
nose (behind this) is a small pit, lined with cilia, for purposes of
smell. Into this the cerebral vesicle of the larval lancelet opens. The
mouth is well guarded against the intrusion of noxious substances which
have to pass through a vestibule richly provided with sensitive cells,
resembling the taste buds of the human mouth. There is no heart. In this,
as in the case of the eye, the lancelet is lower than the ascidians, the
insects, crustaceans, and many molluscs. It approximates those worms
which, despite a very elaborate vascular system, are destitute of a heart,
the function of which is performed by contractile blood-vessels. From an
embryologic and morphologic standpoint the proximate ancestor of the
vertebrates may have been a free swimming animal, intermediate between an
ascidian tadpole and the lancelet, and the primordial ancestor, a
worm-like animal organised on a level with the star-fish. The vertebrates
embryologically develop from this stage to the lampreys; thence to the
cartilaginous fish (shark); to the amphibia (frog, toad, axolotl); to the
reptiles; and thence to the oviparous mammals (duck-bill and echidna or
spiny ant-eater); to the lemurs, and through forms like the
_Pithecanthropus erectus_ to man. Mammal teeth pass, in evolution, from
the simple types found in that oviparous edentate, the spiny ant-eater of
Australia, to those of the indeciduous ancestors of the sloths and
armadilloes, and their descendants, inclusive of the dolphins and whales,
whose teeth, both in the fetal Greenland and adult sperm whale, preserve
this old type. (The whales have degenerated from the hoofed mammals to
suit their environment.) While, as in the edentates, these teeth may be
few, they may also, as in the insectivorous marsupials, approximate those
of the reptilia in number (sixty or seventy on a side) and characteristic
location.
The evolution of this primitive tooth to the bicuspid and molar type has
been explained by two theories: that of concrescence and that of
differentiation.[216]
A number of conical teeth, in line as they lie in the jaws of the sperm
whale, represent the primitive dentition.[217] In time a number of these
teeth, according to the concresent theory, cluster together so as to form
the four cusps of a human molar, each one of the whale tooth points
forming one of the cusps of the mammalian tooth. Vertically succeeding
teeth might also be grouped. What evidence is there in favour of this
theory? and what is there against it? All primitive reptiles from which
the mammals have descended, and many of the existing mammals, have a large
number of isolated teeth of a conical form. Further, by shortening of the
jaws, the embryonic germ from which each of the numerous tooth-caps is
budded off in course of development could have been brought together in
such a manner that any cusps originally stretched out in a line would form
groups of a variable number of cusps, according to the more or less
complex pattern of the crown. Against the acceptance of this theory stands
the fact that cusps quite similar in all respects to each of the cusps
which form the angles of the human molar are even now being added to the
teeth in certain animals, such as the elephant, whose molar teeth cusps
are being thus complicated. In the mesozoic period certain animals with
tricuspid teeth occur. According to the theory of concrescence these teeth
ought not to show any increase of cusps in later geologic periods, but
down through the ages to the present time successors of those animals
continue to present a very much larger number of cusps. How is this
increase of cusps to be accounted for? Has there been a reserve store of
conical teeth to increase the number? Most obviously to every student of
the fossil history of cusps there is no reserve store, but new cusps are
constantly rising upon the original crown itself by cusp addition.
In the Triassic occur the first mammalia with conical, round, reptilian
teeth. There are also some aberrant types which possess complex or
multitubercular teeth.
These teeth begin to show the first trace of cusp addition.
In Fig. 1, Plate A, the teeth of the dromatherium of the coal beds of
North Carolina occur on the sides of the main cone, cusps or rudimentary
cuspules. On either side of the main cone are two cuspules. In the same
deposit occurred another animal represented by a single tooth (Fig. 3), in
which these cusps are slightly larger. These cusps have obviously been
added to the side of the teeth and are now growing. In teeth of the
Jurassic period, found in large numbers both in America and in England,
but still of very minute size, are observed the same three cusps. These
cusps have now taken two different positions; in one case they have the
arrangement presented in Plate B. The middle cusp is relatively lower, and
the lateral cusps are relatively higher; in fact these cones are almost
equal in size. These teeth are termed triconodont, as having three nearly
equal cones. But associated with this is the spalacotherium, the teeth of
which are represented in Plate A, Fig. 4. This tooth illustrates the
transformation of a tooth (triconodont) with three cusps in line into a
tooth with three cusps forming a triangle. Here the primitive cusp is
the apex of a triangle of which the two lateral cusps are the base. This
tooth, in this single genus, is the key of comparison of the teeth of all
mammalia. By this can be determined that part of a human molar which
corresponds with a conical reptilian tooth. This stage is the triangle
stage; the next stage is the development of a heel or spur upon this
triangle (see in the amphitherium, Fig. 5). The opossum still distinctly
preserves the ancient triangle. Look at it in profile, inside or in top
view, and see that the anterior part of the tooth is unmodified. This
triangle is traceable through a number of intermediate types. In Miacia
(Fig. 6), a primitive carnivore, is a high triangle and a heel; looked at
from above (Fig. 6a), the heel is seen to have spread out broader so that
it is as broad as the triangle. The three molars of this animal illustrate
a most important principle, namely, that the anterior, triangular portion
of the crown has been simply levelled down to the posterior portion.
[Illustration: PLATE A.]
[Illustration: PLATE B.]
These three teeth form a series of intermediate steps between a most
ancient molar and the modern molar of the human type. The second tooth is
halfway between the first and third. The second molar, seen from above,
has exactly the same cusps as the first, so it is not difficult to
recognise that each cusp has been directly derived from its fellow. The
third tooth of the series (Fig. 7) has lost one of its cusps; it has lost
a cusp of the triangle. It is now a tooth where only half the triangle is
left on the anterior side and with a very long heel. That tooth has
exactly the same pattern as the lower human molar tooth (Fig. 8), the only
difference is that the heel is somewhat more prolonged. These teeth belong
to one of the oldest fossil monkeys, anaptomorphus. Human lower molars,
not very exceptionally, instead of four cusps, have five. The fifth cusp
always appears in the middle of the heel, or between the posterior lingual
and the posterior buccal. This occurs in monkeys and other animals, but no
record exists of the ancient anterior lingual reappearing. The human lower
molar, with its low, quadritubercular crown, has hence evolved by addition
of cusps and by gradual modelling from a high-crowned, simple, pointed
tooth.
Human teeth are of excellent service in the initial determination of
degeneracy in the child. For this purpose the teeth should be studied from
the first evidence of their development until they are all in place, which
occurs normally, in most cases, by the twenty-second year.
Teeth-enamel is formed from the epiblast, and dentine, cementum, pulp
(except as to nerve tissue) from the mesoblast. The enamel organs of the
first set appear during the seventh week of foetal life; the dentine bulb
during the ninth week. At this period the tooth obtains its periphery.
This models the enamel cap which fits over the dentine like a glove. When
imperfections in hand or fingers exist these deformities are distinctly
observed upon the glove, and in precisely the same manner are observed the
different shapes and sizes of the incisors, cuspids, and molars.
Calcification of the teeth begins at the seventeenth week of foetal life.
The illustration (Fig. 50) shows the progress of calcification and
development of the temporary set of teeth. Examination will show that any
defect in nutrition, from conception to birth (due to inherited states or
maternal impressions), has been registered upon the teeth. The state of
the constitution and the locality register the date of such defects. Thus
if the tooth, as a whole, be larger or smaller than normal, or abnormally
irregular, taint is undoubtedly inherited from one or both parents. If, on
the other hand, there be defect at any part on the crowns of the teeth,
and the contour be perfect, the date of malnutrition can be easily
determined from this chart. More or less than the normal number of teeth,
abnormally placed, demonstrates the existence of inherited defect, since
the germs must have been deposited at the period mentioned. No absolute
rule can be laid down as to date of the eruption of the teeth. The teeth
of the temporary set erupt nearly as follows:
_After Birth._ _Time of Eruption._
Lower Central Incisors 7 months 1 to 10 weeks.
Upper " " 9 months 4 to 6 weeks.
Upper and Lower Lateral 12 months 4 to 6 weeks.
First Molars 14 months 1 to 2 months.
Cuspids 18 months 2 to 3 months.
Second Molars 26 months 3 to 5 months.
[Illustration: FIG. 50.]
[Illustration: FIG. 51. SHOWS LINES OF DEVELOPMENT OF THE PERMANENT
TEETH.]
The enamel organs and dentine bulb for the permanent teeth form just
before birth (Fig. 51) in like manner with the temporary set. They form
just above the temporary set on the upper and below on the lower jaw. The
permanent molars begin to calcify at the twenty-fifth week of foetal life.
The permanent incisors do not calcify until a year after birth. Any
deviation in size or contour of the permanent teeth from the normal must
hence be due to defect in nutrition in the dentine bulb, between the
fifteenth and twenty-fifth week of foetal life. Any deviation in
calcification (except the cusps of the first permanent molars) must occur
after birth. At the third year twenty-four teeth are fairly well
calcified. At the fifth year the second permanent molars, and at the
eighth year the third molars or wisdom teeth, begin to calcify.
The following table gives the age of eruption of permanent teeth:
First Permanent Molars Circa 6 years.
Upper and Lower Central Incisors " 7 years.
Upper and Lower Lateral " " 8 years.
First Bicuspids " 9 years.
Second Bicuspids " 10 years.
Cuspids " 11 years.
Second Permanent Molars " 12 years.
Third Permanent Molars " 17 to 24 years.
Man, at this present stage of evolution, has twenty teeth in his temporary
and thirty-two in his permanent set. Any deviation in number is the result
of embryonic change occurring between the sixth and fifteenth week, for
the temporary teeth, and the fifteenth week and birth for the permanent.
The germs of teeth which erupt late in life, and are called third sets, of
necessity appear ere birth and are completely formed at the beginning of
the second year, although they remain protected in the jaw until
eruption.
More than twenty teeth in the temporary set, or thirty-two in the
permanent set, is hence an atavistic abnormality. From the maxillary and
dental standpoint man reached his highest development when well-developed
jaws held twenty temporary and thirty-two permanent teeth. Decrease in the
numbers of teeth meant, from the dental standpoint, degeneracy, albeit it
might mark advance in man's evolution as a complete being. In the New
Mexican Lower Eocene occur monkeys like the lemurarius and limnotherium,
each the type of a distinct family. The lemurarius, most nearly allied to
the lemurs, is the most generalised monkey yet found. It had forty-four
teeth in continuous series, above and below. The limnotherium, while
related to the lemurs, had some affinities with the American marmosets.
These solved the problem of the origin of the extra teeth (known as
supernumeraries) that sometimes occur in man, and demonstrated that man,
during his evolution from the lowest monkey, lost twelve teeth. These
supernumerary teeth assume two forms; either they resemble the adjoining
teeth or are cone-shaped. While they are rarely exactly counterparts,
every tooth can be duplicated, as the following illustrations show.
Fig. 52 illustrates fairly well-formed duplicate central incisors, the
normal incisors being outside the dental arch. They are crowded laterally
by the large roots of the supernumerary incisors.
[Illustration: FIG. 52.]
[Illustration: FIG. 53.]
[Illustration: FIG. 54.]
Fig. 53 shows an extra right lateral in a temporary set in the upper jaw.
Fig. 54 an extra right lateral in the permanent set. Fig. 55 illustrates
normally developed supernumerary cuspids which are all grouped together
upon the right side, the bicuspid being also duplicated on each side;
indeed, all but the molars are duplicate. Fig. 56 shows supernumerary
third molars, easily demarcated from the normal molars. The teeth which
fail to approximate their normal neighbours assume the cone shape of the
primitive tooth.
[Illustration: FIG. 55.]
[Illustration: FIG. 56.]
The fact that the cone-shaped tooth, as a rule perfect in construction, is
found everywhere in the jaw, but especially in the anterior and posterior
part of the mouth, is of much value in outlining tooth and jaw evolution,
especially in the degeneracy phase. The upper jaw, being an integral part
of the skull and fixed, is, of necessity, influenced by brain and skull
growth; hence degeneracy is more detectable in it than in the lower.
[Illustration: FIG. 57.]
[Illustration: FIG. 58.]
[Illustration: FIG. 59.]
[Illustration: FIG. 60.]
[Illustration: FIG. 61.]
The evolution of the jaw is toward shortening in both directions. This
shortening will continue so long as the jaw must be adjusted to a varying
environment. The jaw of man having originally contained more teeth than at
present, lack of adjustment to environment produces, from the shortening,
degeneracy of the jaw and atavism of the teeth. While this may coincide
with general advances of the individual, it indicates that he is not yet
adjusted to his new environment. The shortening of the upper jaw causes
supernumerary, cone-shaped teeth to erupt, in mass, at the extreme ends of
the jaw, as shown in the following figures. Fig. 57 illustrates a
cone-shaped tooth between the two central incisors, forcing them out of
position. Fig. 58 shows three supernumerary teeth--a cone-shaped tooth
between the central laterals, and the cuspids out of position. The left
permanent lateral is at the median line; another cone-shaped tooth remains
in the vault, while the supernumerary left lateral is in place. As many as
eight are at times to be observed in the anterior vault. Posteriorly these
teeth are most often noticed in connection with the third molars, usually
on a line with other teeth posterior to the last molar. Fig. 59 shows two
supernumerary teeth in the anterior and two in the posterior part of the
left arch; the molars have been extracted. Supernumerary teeth are not
confined to these localities, but may be observed at any point in the
dental arch (Figs. 60 and 61). The primitive cone-shaped tooth is rarely
observed in the lower jaw. In twenty-six years' practice I have not seen a
case. The mobility of the lower jaw prevents that mal-adjustment to
environment present in the upper. The continual shortening, in both
directions, of the jaw causes the third molars frequently to wedge in
between the angle of the jaw and the second molars, so that eruption, if
possible, is difficult.
[Illustration: FIG. 62.]
[Illustration: FIG. 63.]
[Illustration: FIG. 64.]
The third molar is often absent in the English-speaking and Scandinavian
races. In 46 per cent. of 670 patients it was missing. Frequently its
development is abortive. This tooth, in the struggle for existence, seems
destined to disappear. It is more often absent from the upper than the
lower jaw. When absent, or badly developed, the jaw is smaller and
frequently teeth irregularities, nasal stenosis, hypertrophy of nasal bone
and mucous membrane, adenoids and eye disorders coexist. Fig. 62 shows
absence of the left third molar with irregularities of that side of the
arch. In Fig. 63 both third molars are seen to be missing. Anteriorly,
the lateral incisors are most often wanting; 14 per cent. of the laterals
were wanting in 670 patients. In the progress of evolution man has lost
one lateral upon each side of the mouth and the second lateral seems also
destined to disappear. In Fig. 64 the left lateral incisor has
disappeared; and in Fig. 65 both lateral incisors are absent. Not
infrequently does it occur that centrals, cuspids, bicuspids, and even
molars are absent, even their germs not being detectable. Fig. 66 shows
three supernumeraries in the anterior part of the mouth and but two
molars. The absence of the teeth indicates lack of development of germs,
due either to heredity or defective maternal nutrition at the time of
conception or during early pregnancy.
[Illustration: FIG. 65.]
[Illustration: FIG. 66.]
[Illustration: FIG. 67.]
Crescent-shaped, bitubercular, and tribucular as well as deformed teeth,
tend to be cone-shaped. The malformation of these teeth results from
precongenital trophic change in dentine development, dwarfing and notching
the cutting and grinding edges of the second set of teeth, of which a
familiar example is the so-called Hutchinson's teeth, usually referred to
a syphilitic causation. Hutchinson's position has, however, been more
strongly stated than his words justify, since he admits that in at least
one-tenth of the cases this cause could be excluded.
Syphilis only plays the part of a diathetic state profoundly affecting the
maternal constitution at the time of dentine development; while these
teeth may be due to secondary results of syphilis, they do not
demonstrate syphilitic heredity.
In Fig. 67 are seen the teeth of an individual affected with
constitutional disease (referring to Fig. 51 it becomes evident that the
defective lines represent the respective ages, 2-1/2, 4, and 5 years). The
degree of pitting will depend, as a rule, on the severity of the
constitutional disorder. In the case just cited, however, although
nutrition was but slightly disordered, each tooth shows a tendency to
conate. Not infrequently cavities extend completely through the tooth. The
cusps of the (permanent) first molars, calcifying at the first year, are
usually attacked also, and arrested in development, producing the cone
shape. These data, together with the dates of eruption of the temporary
and permanent teeth, furnish an absolute basis for calculation as to
malnutrition producing excessive or arrested development, not only of the
teeth and jaws but all parts of the body.
[Illustration: FIG. 68.]
[Illustration: FIG. 69.]
[Illustration: FIGS. 70, 71.]
Fig. 68 shows a very degenerate jaw with cone-shaped, malformed
bicuspids. The right lateral missing, the cuspids are erupting in the
vault and the dental arch is assuming a V-shape. The jaw shows, as a
whole, marked arrest in development. Fig. 69 shows Hutchinson's teeth.
Were the first molars visible, they would present marked contraction of
the outer surface with a malformed centre. Referring again to Fig. 51, it
is observable that trophic changes affected the system at the age of
birth. The outer surface exhibits a tendency to take the cone shape. Figs.
70, 71, 72, 73, and the molars in Fig. 66, exhibit malformations that
assume the cone shape and the centre frequently associated with this type
of teeth. The coincidence in form between Hutchinson's and malformed teeth
and those of the chameleon suggests that tropho-neurotic change produces
atavistic teeth. Fig. 74 illustrates the tendency of human bicuspids (when
there is no antagonism) to rotate one-fourth round, thus again indicating
an atavistic tendency toward the teeth of the chameleon. Fig. 75 exhibits
extreme atavism; all teeth anterior to the molars are cone-shaped. The
third molars are missing and would, probably, never erupt. In Fig. 76
appears more marked atavism. The upper and lower are both cone-shaped, and
the superior first bicuspid exhibits tendency thereto. The right superior
second bicuspid, second and third molars, the right inferior first and
second bicuspids, with second and third molars are missing. The same
condition, probably, exists on the left side. The space in the upper jaw
is due to the insufficient width of the teeth. Alternation of teeth in the
upper and lower jaw is a reptilian feature.
[Illustration: FIG. 72.]
[Illustration: FIG. 73.]
[Illustration: FIG. 74.]
[Illustration: FIG. 75.]
Fig. 76 furnishes excellent illustration of the principles already stated.
In degenerate jaws every tooth in the jaw, at one point or another, may
display rudimentary cusps. On the incisors they are always to be found on
the lingual surface.
[Illustration: FIG. 76.]
[Illustration: FIG. 77.]
Fig. 77 illustrates the centrals with two rudimentary cusps, the laterals
with one, and the cuspids with one also. Fig. 78 represents cusps upon the
lingual surface of the molars. The cuspids are not unlike the lower
cuspids with a rudimentary lingual cusp.
[Illustration: FIG. 78.]
There is a gradation from central incisors toward the bicuspids, in
evolution. This grading of form is not observed in passing from the cuspid
to the bicuspid in man. But the cuspid often presents a cingulum on the
lingual face that inclines it toward the bicuspid forms in lower mammals,
like the mole, and the first premolar, or bicuspid, is then more
caniniform, the inner tubercle being much more reduced. This inner
tubercle is very variable and erratic as to its position. It appears as
far front as the centrals and is often present on the lingual face of the
laterals of man. The lingual tubercle is very constant on the first
bicuspid of man and is as well developed as the buccal. But in some lower
forms, as in the lemurs, it is quite deficient. It attains the highest
development only in the anthropoids and man. Considering these stages of
development, the grading from the cuspid to the bicuspid forms was more
gradual in the earlier species than in the later, where the individual
teeth have taken on special development.
[Illustration: FIG. 79.]
The skull of a degenerate girl who died from tuberculosis, at thirteen
years, presented, among other stigmata, a cusp on the external surface of
a right inferior cuspid. In Fig. 79, where every tooth is present, a most
remarkable display of cusps occurs. The cusps upon the cutting and
grinding edges are not obliterated. Commencing with the left superior
central incisors, three cusps are present with a rudimentary palatine
cusp. The laterals also show three cusps, while the cuspid has two very
distinct. The first and second bicuspids have tubercular cusps, they
being in line. The buccal cusps upon the molars, two or three, and are
still in position. The palatine cusps are worn away. The same is the case
upon the opposite side, except that the cuspid has cusps that have fused
together, leaving a small projection upon the mesial side and a
rudimentary palatine cusp. The cusp upon the third molar is lost. In
another case (Fig. 61) the primitive cone teeth are seen trying to shape
themselves into incisors. The lateral incisors, cuspids and bicuspids are
still cone-shaped. The first permanent molar is fairly formed while the
second molars are still in a primitive condition.
Degenerate teeth unite in twos, threes, fours, and fives. These single,
cone-shaped teeth grow together and form bicuspids and molars. The germ of
any two normal teeth may intermingle and unite; not only are the crowns
found united with separate roots, but crowns and roots are united
throughout.
Figs. 80 and 81 show two superior, central and lateral incisors joined
together throughout the entire length of crown and root. In Fig. 82 two
lower incisors are united throughout. Fig. 83 shows a cuspid with two
roots. George T. Carpenter, of Chicago, has a right superior, second
bicuspid with three well formed roots. Fig. 84 illustrates two bicuspids
united at the crowns. Fig. 85 shows two molars perfectly united. Fig. 86
illustrates central and lateral incisors of the permanent set perfectly
united. Fig. 87 shows two molars united. Fig. 88 a molar and supernumerary
taking the cone-shape with deformed centre. Fig. 89 shows three malformed
teeth, each coated and completely united. It is not uncommon to find three
molars united together, as, for instance, the second, third, and
supernumerary molars. C. V. Rosser, of Atlanta, Georgia, has two small
molars and a supernumerary cuspid perfectly united, from crown to root,
and these three further united to the roots of a well-formed molar.
[Illustration: FIG. 80.]
[Illustration: FIG. 81.]
[Illustration: FIG. 82.]
[Illustration: FIG. 83.]
[Illustration: FIG. 84.]
[Illustration: FIG. 85.]
[Illustration: FIG. 86.]
That human jaws, like human ears, are degenerating is demonstrable by
actual measurements. Mummery, who examined the skulls of 200 Briton and
Roman soldiers, found the narrowest 2·12 inches, the highest 2·62, with an
average of 2·50. The width of jaws of 402 British soldiers to-day is:
narrowest, 1·88; widest, 2·63; average 2·28. The highest width was very
rare; only eight measured 2·50. The jaws of the mound builders, compared
with the existing cliff dwellers, show similar results. The average width
is about 2·50 inches. This is also true of nearly pure negro races.
Measurements of normal jaws of 855 Italians of Central Italy were:
narrowest, 1·88; widest, 2·63; average 2·17. Measurements of normal jaws
of 4,935 Americans gave the following results: narrowest, 1·75; widest,
only one case, 2·56; average 2·13. If in the highest type of physical man
the width of the upper jaw from the outer surface of the permanent molars
near the gum margin was originally 2·50 inches in diameter, the jaw of
people now living in the same locality is from 0·25 to 0·33 inches
smaller. Although the jaw has thus been growing smaller, since there are
no breaks or deformities in the contour of the dental arch this must be
regarded simply as an adaptation to environment, and not degeneracy in the
proper sense of the term. The degeneracy of the jaws, on which I would lay
special stress, is that in which deformity has resulted from inability to
adjust structure to a changing environment. When arrest of development so
takes place that deformities of the dental arch result, the jaws vary from
two inches to one inch in width. As a rule, the teeth are the same size
to-day that they were thousands of years ago. This is due to the fact that
they are ante-natal and not influenced by post-natal systemic changes. The
jaws do not contract as a result of mouth breathing.[218] If the jaw be
arrested and be smaller in circumference than the teeth, a break takes
place in the dental arch and deformity results. Two types of deformity
occur, the V-shaped arch and the saddle arch. All other types of
deformity, not due to local causes, are modifications of these two. These
deformities always occur with the second teeth only. In these cases the
facial profile assumes the perpendicular line or arrested face, as
illustrated in the chapter on Degeneracy of the Face. They are never seen
before the sixth year, when the second set begin to erupt and are complete
with development of the second molars at 12. They may become exaggerated
later in life from want of room, the eruption of the third molar and want
of harmony in relation of the two jaws when closed.
[Illustration: FIG. 87.]
[Illustration: FIG. 88.]
[Illustration: FIG. 89.]
[Illustration: FIG. 90.]
There are three characteristics of the normal arch. Independent of
temperamental peculiarities, the line extending from one cuspid to the
other should be an arc of a circle, not an angle or straight line; the
lines from the cuspids to the third molar should be straight, curving
neither in nor out, the sides not approximating parallel lines. Absolute
bilateral uniformity is not implied in this, as the two sides of the
human jaw are rarely, if ever, wholly alike. A uniform arch necessitates
uniformity of development between the arch of the maxilla and the arch of
the teeth and a correct position of the individual teeth in their relation
to each other. When there is inharmonious development between the jaws and
the teeth, as may happen when one parent has a small maxilla with
correspondingly small teeth, and the other a large one, with
correspondingly large teeth, if the child inherit the jaw of one and the
teeth of the other, irregularities must follow. Such difference in
diameter between the arch of the maxilla and that of the crowns of the
teeth is a constitutional cause of irregularity. When there is a
difference between these diameters the line formed by the teeth must
either fall outside or within the arch of the maxilla and irregularities
of arrangements result. The primary division of irregularities is the
V-shaped and saddle-shaped arches. We have the V-shaped variety (Fig. 90,
one of the typical forms), where the apex of a triangle is formed by the
incisors, the base of the triangle being a line connecting the first two
molars. If, because of premature or tardy extraction, the first molars
move forward, or by coincidence of the arch of the maxilla and the arch of
the crown of the teeth in trying to accommodate itself to the lesser arch
of the maxilla, the arch becomes a broken line, forming an angle at the
incisors. This angle results from two causes: the thinness of the process
at this point and the diminution of resistance which must follow.
When the permanent bicuspids erupt under a favourable condition, so that
their greatest diameter is in a line with the greater diameter of both
cuspids and first molar, they will be held firmly in place, since the
greatest pressure is on this very line. On the other hand, when the
bicuspids are erupted after their proper time, while the cuspids progress
duly, and meeting no resistance fall into their proper places, but the
bicuspids adapt themselves as best they can to the space left for them,
and if the arch of the maxilla does not coincide with that of the crowns,
they must fall within or without the arch. Now, if the first molar have
moved forward, diminishing the space, the bicuspid must erupt either
within or without the arch.
[Illustration: FIG. 91.]
To understand why they are generally found within the arch, the shape of
the molar and cuspids must be kept in mind. A transverse section of their
crowns shows their proximal walls not to be parallel, but wedge-shaped,
their diameter being greater on the buccal than on the palatal side. When
the crowned bicuspid falls within the greatest diameter of these teeth,
finding more room within the arch, they naturally slip in the direction of
least resistance, _i.e._, toward the palate. A local cause for the same
condition is found in the fact that the crown of the bicuspids, before
their eruption, was held between the roots of the temporary molars, and,
as these form an arch of a smaller circle than that of the permanent
teeth, the bicuspids will be found generally inside the arch. From both
causes occurs an inward curvature, which is termed the saddle-shaped arch
(Fig. 91). It should be noted here that, since the V-shaped irregularity
is found anterior to the cuspid, the upper incisors are always projecting
beyond the lower; the saddle-shaped irregularity is invariably posterior
to the cuspid from an inward curve. The incisors never project. Both forms
contract the arch; the V-shaped anteriorly, the saddle-shaped posteriorly.
In both forms the forward movement of the first molar is the local cause.
Deformities of the dental arch are due, first, to arrest of development of
the jaws, and, second, in the nature of the deformity, to the order of
eruption of teeth, which rarely erupt twice alike. From an evolution
standpoint these deformities are atavistic. The V-shaped reverts to the
reptilian type; the saddle-shaped to the lower mammals. In the gorilla,
the nearest to man in dentition, there is a very distinct approach to the
saddle shape. In the chimpanzee it remains. The orang-outang exhibits less
of this tendency. The arch of some of the cebidæ very nearly approaches
man. It all depends upon the extent of prognathism. When that is reduced
the arch appears and rectangular arrangements of the teeth are lost. Most
carnivors exhibit a distinct approach to the saddle shape. Some felines
have a shortening of the jaw, partly obliterating the tendency, but in
most canidæ it is quite marked.
These are facts which cannot be overlooked, since, from the very nature of
development and eruption of the teeth, they cannot take any other form.
The arrangement of the crowns of the cuspid (canine) in the jaw before
eruption is such that, no matter what the local condition of the jaws or
teeth may be the V-shaped or saddle-shaped dental arch must be produced.
[Illustration: FIG. 92.]
In no symptoms is degeneracy so evident as in the stigmata resultant on
hypertrophy of the alveolar process. This occurs at all ages, but more
particularly at the period of development of the permanent set of teeth.
The entire alveolar process may become involved (Fig. 92), or only a
portion (Fig. 93).
Hypertrophy of the alveolar process is the result of irritation incident
upon eruption and the shedding of the temporary teeth, and eruption of the
permanent teeth.
[Illustration: FIG. 93.]
Laryngologists, rhinologists, and neurologists claim that certain vaults
are deformities; in reality the alveolar process is hypertrophied. The
jaws, as a whole, owing to an unstable and ill-balanced nervous system,
are liable to become excessively developed, as well as arrested in
development. Excessive development of the superior maxilla is evinced by a
fulness of the upper lip. In these cases the upper maxilla is too large
for the lower, and stands out beyond it. The lower may be quite normal.
When there is simply a want of proportion between the two jaws, it is due
to the diminutive or excessive size of one while the other is normal. The
criterion in these cases must be the facial angle. The upper jaw is
usually in harmony with the skeleton, while the lower jaw depends for its
size largely upon function, its size being the result of accident rather
than the result of general proportions.
[Illustration: FIG. 94.]
When the upper jaw is normal, or smaller than the lower, the extent of the
posterior portion is determined by the occlusion of the first permanent
molar, which keeps the alveolar processes in permanent relation to each
other at this point and allows freedom of development in front. If the
occlusion be not normal, the upper jaw and alveolar process will develop
laterally as well as anteriorly. The teeth of the anterior columns may
either stand vertically, or they may be turned in toward the lower
incisors. The latter defect is produced by the action of the lips. When
the cuspids are in their normal position the upper incisors form a larger
arch than the lower, and this permits of their being turned inward; but
when the cuspids have moved so far forward that they are not normally
interlocked with the lower teeth, the incisors are too crowded to permit
this. While the jaws are growing smaller the teeth tend to cause reversion
to the original form. Arrest of development of the superior maxilla is
always associated with marked depression at the alæ of the nose, producing
the appearance of having been hollowed out from a point at the floor of
the orbit to the grinding surface of the lower teeth (Fig. 94).
[Illustration: FIG. 95.]
Arrest of the lower jaw (Fig. 95) is common among degenerates. This
consists of a shortening of the body of the jaw. Sometimes it is arrested
to such an extent that there is apparently no chin. About 50 per cent. of
criminals of Elmira, New York, have this deformity. The following table
shows the number of deformities of the jaws and teeth which I have found
among some of the degenerate classes.
-----------+------------------------------------------------------------
JAWS. |Number examined.
| +-------------------------------------------------------
| |V-shaped.
| | +---------------------------------------------------
| | |Partial V.
| | | +----------------------------------------------
| | | | Semi-V.
| | | | +------------------------------------------
| | | | |Saddle.
| | | | | +--------------------------------------
| | | | | |Partial Saddle.
| | | | | | +---------------------------------
| | | | | | |Semi-Saddle.
| | | | | | | +-----------------------------
| | | | | | | |Normal.
| | | | | | | | +------------------------
| | | | | | | | |Arrested Development.
| | | | | | | | | +--------------------
| | | | | | | | | |Excessive
| | | | | | | | | |Development.
-----------| | | | | | | | | | +----------------
TEETH. | | | | | | | | | | |Irregular.
| | | | | | | | | | | +------------
| | | | | | | | | | | |Tubercles
| | | | | | | | | | | |of teeth.
| | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | |Present.
| | | | | | | | | | | | +---------
| | | | | | | | | | | | |Tubercles
| | | | | | | | | | | | |of teeth.
| | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | |Absent.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | +----
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |Reg-
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |ular.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
-----------+----+---+----+---+---+----+---+----+---+---+---+--+----+---
Criminals | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
at | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Pontiac, | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Ill. | 465| 75| 71| 3| 66| 63| 16| 171|...|...|123|13| 452|342
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Criminals | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
at | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Elmira, | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
N. Y. |1041|381| 49| 1|157| 26|...| 422|...|...|220|26|1015|821
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Criminals | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
at | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Joliet, | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Ill. | 468| 13| 79| 19| 59| 92| 24| 163|...|...|...|..|... |...
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Prostitutes| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
at Chicago,| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Bridewell | 30| 10| 17| 7| 27| 10| 10| ...| 1|...|...|..|... |...
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Insane at | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Dunning, | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Ill. | 700| 26| 47|...| 12| ...|...| 486|...|...|...|..|... |...
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Insane at | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Kankakee, | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Ill. | 613| 69| 107| 29| 89| 105| 61| 153|...|...|...|..|... |...
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Idiots, | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
imbeciles |1977|129| 236|...|207| ...|...|1095|...|...|...|..|... |...
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Deaf and | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Dumb |1935|169| 192|...|203| ...|...| 901|...|...|...|..|... |...
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Blind | 207| 7| 9|...| 11| ...|...| 105|...|...|...|..|... |...
| | | | | | | | | | | | | |
Inebriates | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
[219] | 514|1·5|24·4|0·3|9·3|13·2|7·7|25·4|...|...|...|..|... |...
-----------+----+---+----+---+---+----+---+----+---+---+---+--+----+----
CHAPTER XIV
DEGENERACY OF THE BODY
As degeneracy checks the natural course of embryonic development it
necessarily finds expression in the body as well as in the skull. One most
striking condition is that by which development of the bones enclosing the
spinal cord is checked. The spinal cord is at first essentially a
notochord as in the lowest types of vertebrates. The structures
surrounding the cord are not divided into vertebræ. This condition is
permanent in the lancelet. Around the notochord is later formed a species
of membrane which protects it, called the perichord. This condition is the
second stage of development of the cord and is the permanent condition in
the lampreys. Later still the cartilaginous vertebræ develop, and then
these ossify at the point in the perichord which is to form a vertebra,
bows of dense tissue form which unite behind. In front similar bows form
to constitute the bodies of the vertebræ. These bows remain ununited in
some of the lower fish and at certain stages in the human embryo. As
degeneracy checks the union of the bows of the vertebræ, imperfection, and
even absence, of the union occur, which is called spina-bifida (Fig. 96).
This condition when complete is rarely compatible with life. In a partial
state it is often found among degenerates.[220] The seat of the trouble is
frequently covered by an excessive development of hair (hypertrichosis),
especially in the small of the back; this, which occurs very frequently in
degenerates, resembles the tail which the ancients represented as that of
the fauns.[221]
[Illustration: FIG. 96.]
As the vertebræ unite irregularly, deviations or bends of the spine occur
very frequently among degenerates. These may be of any of the types known
to surgeons. In man the spinal column terminates in two bones. One of
those (composed of five vertebræ) begins at eighteen years to unite slowly
into a single bone called the sacrum. The bones of the sacral vertebræ
form processes similar to those which are formed from the vertebræ of the
chest region. These serve to cover the nerves of the sacral region. The
bone immediately below the sacrum, called the coccyx, is essentially the
representative of the tail in man. At a certain stage of human
development, as in the tadpole, the tail disappears, the nine vertebræ
forming the coccyx unite together and become a very diminutive bone which
loses nearly all vertebral characteristics. Sometimes this bone retains
its embryonic peculiarities to such an extent that it simulates in some
degenerates a rudimentary tail. Of this many instances are on record. A
greater degree of this condition has been found to occur, with comparative
frequency, amongst the lowest negro races. In this respect these are below
the anthropoid apes, where the tail, considered from the tail standpoint,
has degenerated as in man for the benefit of the organism as a whole.
[Illustration: FIG. 97.]
The ribs and breastbone develop from the processes of the vertebræ. It is
probable that every vertebra originally had ribs. Traces of these exist in
most vertebræ in the human embryo. In man, as a rule, there are but twelve
vertebræ which develop true ribs. In degenerates, as in the gibbon, a
thirteenth pair sometimes appears. Normally, the two lowest ribs are,
however, very imperfectly developed as compared with the other ten, and
one is sometimes absent. The rib develops from the ends of the vertebral
bows, which, coming in contact with the muscle plates of their own segment
of the body, are by the resulting bulging forced to expand, and later come
together through the formation of the breastbone. Checking of these
conditions produces various deformities of the chest which have been
divided into "funnel-shaped" and "dropper" deformities.[222] Frequently
the entire chest wall is arrested early in life (Fig. 97). The relation
between the muscle plates and the course of development of the chest is
illustrated by the fact that an arrest of development of important muscles
often coexists with deformities of the chest. The human limbs are
developments from the fin-folds as found in fishes and the human embryo.
In one of these the fins are divided into four segments. The upper segment
contains one long bone, the humerus (or arm bone), or the femur (or thigh
bone). The second segment contains two long bones, the radius and ulna (or
arm bones), or the tibia and fibula (or leg bones). The third segment
consists of nine small bones, the carpals of the wrist or the tarsals of
the ankle. The fourth segment consists of five separate digits. These
limbs pass through three stages in embryonic development as to their
position, which may be designated as amphibian, reptilian, and mammalian.
Many of these bones fuse together (carpals and tarsals). The digits have
long before the late fish stage been formed of more than one bone. At
times this condition persists even after the completion of human embryonic
development. Limb anomalies resulting from checks of development causing
either excess or arrest of development are far from uncommon among
degenerates, but are not so common as anomalies of form and proportion.
Among such anomalies may be mentioned joined limbs (symelia), or the more
or less complete absence of limbs (ectromelia), or the absence of a
peripheric segment (hemimelia), or the complete or partial absence of a
central segment (phocomelia). Among the other important degeneracies of
the limbs are supernumerary digits. These Annadale[223] classifies as:
First, a deficient digit loosely attached to the hand or foot or to
another digit. Second, a more or less developed digit free at its
extremity and articulating with other bones. Thirdly, a fully developed
separate digit. Fourth, a digit united along its whole length with another
digit. The first three types have been called polydactylia. The last has
been called syndactylia. There is finally a condition in which union
between the digits results in the disappearance of some of the fingers and
toes (Fig. 98). This condition is called ectrodactylia. Supernumerary
digits to the extent of six fingers and six toes are exceedingly common in
the families of degenerates. The influence of heredity in this particular
has been well demonstrated. The Kelleia family of Malta was one of the
earliest reported. The condition may last for five generations,[224] but
often disappears on marriage with normal persons outside the community or
family. A family of the Arabian Hyabites, named Boldi, confined marriages
to their own tribe. They all have twenty-four digits. Children born with a
normal number are killed as being the offspring of adultery. The
inhabitants of Cycaux, France, till the end of the eighteenth century, had
nearly all supernumerary digits either on the hands or feet. Isolated in a
mountainous region, they for years intermarried. On communication being
opened, they emigrated or married strangers, and sexdigitism vanished.
Maupertius reports the case of a German family whose members had
twenty-four digits for many generations.[225] One of them refused to
acknowledge a normal child. In one instance in the United States
supernumerary digits lasted through five generations. A case reported[226]
some years ago was the following: The first instance of the appearance of
the deformity was in a man, born of a degenerate family in 1752, who had
six toes on one foot. His son was born with six toes on one foot, but the
daughter was normal. This daughter had five children; among them were a
son and daughter, each of whom had six fingers on one hand. The
granddaughter had eight children, including one son with six toes on one
foot. Another son had two daughters, each having six fingers on each hand,
and one daughter having twenty-four digits. This last girl had three
children; the son was doubly deformed like his mother, while a second son
had six fingers on each hand, the toes being normal. One of the two
daughters of the fourth generation (with only the hands affected) had
eight children, several of whom were normally developed, but the rest were
deformed as follows: One daughter had an osseous thickening at the end of
the digits, one son had twenty-four digits, another had twelve fingers,
the toes being normal in number.
[Illustration: FIG. 98.]
[Illustration: FIG. 99.]
I have elsewhere cited an instance from Kiernan in which unilateral
sexdigitism was found in four generations of Norwegian degenerates.
Not unfrequently polydactylia is associated with the absence or union or
decrease in size of bones of the limbs. It happens that the upper or
lower extremities may be increased or diminished disproportionately
through the body. This disproportion in size of the fingers and toes is
exceedingly frequent. Big digits (macrodactylia, Fig. 99) are
comparatively rare, and may only involve a supernumerary bone in the
thumb. Short digits (microdactylia) are much more frequent. This state may
be constituted by the absence of one bone or the union of two bones, or
the shortening of metacarpal or metatarsal bones, or the shortness of
several phalangeal bones. There may be increased disproportion between the
different fingers. The method of determining this is by comparison with
the middle finger. This disproportion may vary greatly. Féré is of opinion
that shortening of all the fingers constitutes a grave mark of degeneracy.
Relative shortness is exceedingly common.
Under the conditions of development of the limbs from the fin-fold, it
follows that these may be checked completely so that the condition
approximates the earlier development from the fish. On the other hand the
large bones of the arm and thigh may be checked while the digits and the
two lower bones (radius and ulna, tibia and fibula) go on to full
development as do the digits. Sometimes the arms develop completely while
the lower extremity remains in the fin-fold state. On the other hand the
arms may be checked and remain in the fin-fold state while the legs go on
to full development. Sometimes the bones of the arm and forearm are
checked while the digits go on to full development. The lower extremities
are sometimes fused together. This condition, from its resemblance to the
like state in the seal, is called phocomelia, or seal limbs. They are
also called sirens, on account of the resemblance to the sirens of
mythology.[227]
[Illustration: FIG. 100.]
Other expressions of degeneracy, albeit sometimes secondary, are club-foot
and club-hands (Fig. 100). In many instances these are retentions of
positions assumed by the limbs of the foetus in the course of evolution,
and are therefore, in the adult, expressions of degeneracy. Club-foot was
an expression of degeneracy which appeared in Byron, the poet, as a
consequence of the degeneracy present in both the Byrons and the Gordons,
as Kiernan has shown.[228] Commenting on this condition as found in
Byron, F. S. Coolidge, of Chicago, remarks: "Byron undoubtedly suffered
from double congenital club-foot, the deformity being worse on the right."
While in Coolidge's opinion congenital club-foot unquestionably arises
from different causes, it is, however, so frequently an accompaniment of
severe forms of mal-development and of congenital brain defects, that
there can be no doubt but that imperfect constitutional development is one
of its causes. That the deformity with the many limitations which it
involves may tend to create morbidness is very likely to be an additional
symptom of the degeneracy which, in certain cases, is the underlying cause
for the deformity. Dareste, who has studied the club-foot and the
club-hand from the standpoint of experimental teratology, finds that in no
small number of cases club-foot and club-hand result from checked
development. Absence of the kneecap or patella may, as H. N. Moyer has
shown, be an expression of degeneracy.[229]
The conditions resultant on checked development may appear in any of the
bony or muscular structures. At times muscles checked in development pass
on to conditions present in the lower apes.[230] Sometimes the checked
development of bones results in artery courses which are present in some
of the lower animals. Just above the bend of the elbow in the embryo is an
opening through which an artery passes in many quadrupeds. In adult man,
as a rule, this has disappeared, but not rarely in degenerates the opening
persists with the artery through it.
Hernias, of all varieties, are noticeably hereditary,[231] but what is
hereditary is not the rupture, but the laxity of the orifice of the cavity
of the abdomen. As descent of the testicles from the abdomen (where they
are embryonically in man and normally in many animals) is often delayed
and even does not occur in degenerates, hernia of the groin variety is
particularly apt to occur in them. These hernias are often found united
with defects of the testicles as well as deficiencies of the chest.
Deformities of the nose are also especially apt to coexist with these.
Degenerate women frequently have supernumerary milk glands arranged on the
abdomen as in some lemurs, while males may have supernumerary breasts of
either male or female type. These breasts may be represented by nipples
alone. In either sex arrested development of the face, middle ear, and
palate often coexists with these supernumerary breasts.
The degeneracies of the body combine so frequently with those of the skull
and the brain as to indicate a common origin. Polydactylia is found with
almost all the degeneracies of the body. It occurs with all the
degeneracies of the eye, from those which are purely atavistic like
coloboma to those like retinitis pigmentosa and amauroses, which are
atavistic in origin. Hare-lip, cleft palate, and deformities of the jaws
and teeth are often found associated with all the bodily degeneracies and
the nutritive, intellectual, and moral degeneracies as well. Phocomelia
with brain deformity has been found associated with them. Anomalies of the
genital organs are also quite frequently associated with these and with
finger anomalies. In the subjects of juvenile obesity are frequently
associated unstable mentality and will-power, and delayed or precocious
sexual maturity. My own observations have shown this condition to be
frequently associated with the jaw and teeth degeneracies.
[Illustration: FIG. 101.]
Aside from their general significance as stigmata of degeneracy, anomalies
of the external ear have been found frequently associated with
mal-development of lungs, kidneys, liver, and intestines. Hidden
spina-bifida is often associated with the same anomalies, and not rarely
with irregular development of the genital organs of both sexes. Albinism
or deficient pigment in the skin and hair is not only often associated
with grave degeneracies, intellectual and moral, but appears combined with
mal-development of the spleen, liver, and kidneys. The opposite state
(melanoderma, or black skin) is often associated with similar deformities,
especially with early precocity in development. It has also been found in
connection with hairlessness and irregularities in development of the
teeth and jaws.
The deformities of the chest and their resulting interferences with
respiration are not only associated with conditions like narrowing of the
pulmonary artery, of the aorta, and with cardiac deformities, but also
lead to diminution of the respiratory power and, in consequence, to
conditions predisposing to pneumonia and consumption. They are also, as my
own observation has shown, associated with deformities of the face, of the
nose, of the mouth cavity, of the palate, and of the jaws. These
conditions result in mouth breathing and in other conditions which
predispose to the attacks of microbes. The deformities of the arterial
system coexisting with checked development of the chest are apt to extend
to the blood vessels of the kidneys, and therefore to retain these in the
embryonic condition, thus predisposing them to disease. To a somewhat
lesser degree this arterial condition coexisting with checked development
of the chest or with the other arrested conditions of development
associated with it, may extend to the liver in such a degree as to prevent
it destroying the toxins of typhoid fever and allied diseases, thereby
increasing the dangers from these disorders. The same influence may be
exerted on the spleen and suprarenal capsules, thus interfering with the
physiologic guards these organs furnish against disease and its results.
Not infrequently do these last conditions tend to give an epileptic
character to degeneracies which would otherwise be destitute of it. With
the interference with the proper blood supply, due to checked conditions
of the organs named, may occur gout, diabetes, and many forms of
rheumatism with their secondary consequences.
The imperfect and irregular action of the lungs associated with the
arrests in development of the face, nose, palate, jaws, and chest may
produce an irregular blood supply to the brain, which will exaggerate the
mental instability of the degenerate.
Among the conditions which are expressions of degeneracy of the body,
combined with degeneracy of the head and face, are three conditions known
as infantilism, masculinism, and feminism. Practically all three are
arrests of development of the promise of the child type. Owing to the
struggle for existence which occurs at puberty between the old type of the
chondrocranium and its new type as supplemented by the dermal bones, the
nervous system takes a distorted ply which arrests both the bodily,
nervous, and mental development at certain points. In infantilism the
arrest is of the future promise of the child, so that the body and face
remain at the childish point, or the body and nervous system are checked,
or finally the nervous system or certain organs alone are checked while
the body goes on to full development. Not infrequently the face is
arrested at any period from birth to puberty (Fig. 101). Hence the reason
many persons retain their youthful appearance throughout life. These
people are often vain and egotistic. The mental stamina is weak, and they
are frequently unreliable, while the females are often prostitutes or
prurient prudes, hysteric reformers or gossip mongers.
[Illustration: FIG. 102.]
The female type, from the standpoint of bodily and nervous development,
most nearly approximates the promise of the child type, and checks of
development will result in masculinism and feminism. In the first the
female has proceeded so far in development as to have female organs and
their functions while retaining traces of a predominant character of the
lower male type. In the second, the male has proceeded along the line of
evolution toward the female type, but ere sex has been fixed, further
development has been checked and the male type is finally assumed as the
predominant one. Both sexes proceed embryologically from an indifferent
type nearly resembling the hermaphroditic type found in the lower
vertebrates. The arrest of development may therefore take place at any
point in the embryonic evolution. The male may preserve only the female
breasts[232] (Fig. 102), while normal in other respects; or, again (Fig.
103), present cryptorchidism or sloping shoulders, and be otherwise
masculine. On the other hand, his nervous system may have taken such a ply
that at the period of puberty the sexual instincts may be female in type.
In some instances, this may extend merely to an extreme modesty toward
males, to an intense liking for female occupations and disgust for male
occupations. In the female precisely analogous conditions may occur. In
certain cases the sex side is entirely dormant until awakened at puberty.
Education of these cases of arrested development may give the sex
direction rather than any in-born tendency. In one case, a male who had
undergone arrest of development in his evolution towards the female type
was brought up as a girl, had unusually pleasing womanly qualities; as a
result was married twice to intensely devoted husbands, and the real sex
was never even suspected until post-mortem examination revealed that the
supposed woman was a male. In other cases where the nervous system has
taken one sexual ply, while the body has taken another, an exceedingly
unfortunate class of beings results. This class of beings needs especially
careful training during puberty and adolescence. In some instances in
addition to the sexual distortion there exist in these beings conditions
of mental defect and moral obliquity. In the last case they approximate
the criminal type. In the first case residence in an insane hospital
protects the community and these beings against themselves. In some
instances no mental defect nor, in a strict sense, moral obliquity occurs.
Here the patient requires very careful study from every standpoint.[233]
There is in the higher and lower races a tendency in different directions
as to the predominance of sex. The woman of the lower races more nearly
resembles the male of the race. The male of the higher races more nearly
resembles in structure the female of his race than does this female the
females of the lower race. This is in part due, in the course of
evolution, to the intrusion of the male on female occupations, since all
occupations, other than war, hunting, and fishing, were created by
women.[234] The male, however, in the higher races, while thus taking on
the female intellectual and æsthetic qualities, retains the male sexual
characteristics, mentally and physically, but in accordance with the law
of evolution, these manifest themselves less explosively as in the case of
the female. As the victim of masculinism or feminism is a degenerate the
explosive manifestations are more marked. Every one of the stigmata of
degeneracy already described may coexist with any one of the three
conditions named: infantilism, masculinism, and feminism.
[Illustration: FIG. 103.]
[Illustration: FIG. 104.]
Among the most striking manifestations arising from arrest of development
in certain directions with possible hypertrophy in others, are the
conditions known as giantism and dwarfism (_see_ Frontispiece). Both these
conditions may be expressions of atavism to no very remote ancestors and
present little if any evidences of degeneracy. In other cases degeneracy
may be well marked, and the condition be due to imperfect gland action,
such as disorder of the pituitary body, which causes very frequently an
enlargement of many of the bones of the body, and very often a uniform
enlargement of all the bones. Indeed, as Marie has said, giantism is
acromegaly occurring during the period of adolescence. In many instances
the opposite condition, dwarfism, occurs during infancy from causes which
check the further growth of the body, although the general functions
remain unchanged. Dwarfism is very apt to be attended by preservation of
the intellectual faculties without evidence of degeneracy, other than the
egotism shown in extreme vanity. Moral defects are, however, more apt to
occur in dwarfism than in giantism, in which last condition mental defect
is apt to occur, varying from a simple good-humoured stupidity to
feeble-mindedness. In proportion as the central nervous system has been
affected will the stigmata of degeneracy appear in both conditions. As the
line between disease and disordered function is not thinly drawn in these
cases, disorders like rickets or local bony tendencies to extensive growth
may coexist with both conditions. Infantilism is peculiarly apt to occur
with giantism, and while less frequent in dwarfism it also occurs, but is
then especially apt to be associated with rickets.
Closely akin to these conditions are leontiasis ossium and acromegaly,
both of which are characterised by similar trophoneurotic defects. The
first of these conditions may occur precedent to puberty and cease in its
completion. Kiernan has observed this in the case of an imbecile on Ward's
Island, who lived until the age of 75, after spending more than sixty
years in the charitable institutions of New York. His ancestry was of the
criminal and defective classes. Acromegaly is characterised by abnormal
growth, chiefly in the bones of the head, face, and extremities. As a
rule, the disorder begins at the completion of puberty, although it
occasionally occurs at the onset of the climacteric. The illustration
given (Fig. 104) presents the characteristic features of the disease. In
this case there are local evidences of congenital defect. The prevailing
trend of opinion is that this condition is due to irregular action of the
pituitary body which controls osseous development.
[Illustration: FIG. 105.]
As already pointed out in the chapter on Heredity and Atavism, the arrests
of development may affect one side of the body, while the other pursues
the direct course of development. This may show itself in over-growth, as
well as in under-growth, on the affected side. The person may appear, even
from the centre of the forehead down, as if the halves of the bodies of
two different persons had been joined in one. Conditions may vary from
this extreme type to a state in which a lack of proper nerve and blood
supply on the undeveloped side predisposes to attacks of disease, as
already pointed out.
Not rarely does it happen that acromegaly attacks the side most deficient
in nerve supply. The same is true of allied disorders affecting the growth
of the muscles.
The conditions of development may be such that both sides are equally
defective in nerve supply, so that when acromegaly occurs it may attack
both sides equally. This is particularly apt to be the case with the lower
extremities, and enlarged feet (Fig. 105) are not an uncommon result.
[Illustration: FIG. 106.]
The feet, in addition to the condition already described as being common
in both extremities, exhibit special stigmata of their own in consonance
with the evolutionary advance which the foot has shown as compared with
the hand in man's evolution. In the lower races the hollow of the foot
does not exist, and the condition known as flat-foot occurs (Fig. 106).
This is usually associated with low instep. It occurs among the stigmata
of degeneracy, and is not rarely associated with grave moral defects and
intellectual distortions. It and other feet degeneracies have been found
frequently among paranoiacs, moral imbeciles, and prostitutes. This is
particularly true of the prehensile power of the foot.[235]
CHAPTER XV
DEGENERACY IN REVERSIONAL TENDENCIES
The hair of the head and body may never develop from the condition of down
(lanugo) present in the new-born. The hair over the sexual organs may
alone remain in this condition, not showing itself at puberty. In women
the hair may be unusually developed on the face and chest. It may also
cover the whole body, a condition which is normal in the Ainus of Japan.
It may develop, as already shown, very markedly in the lumbar regions.
Speech may be markedly disturbed, reverting to the condition of Haeckel's
Homo-alalus in the shape of deaf-mutism, which is one of the extreme
expressions of degeneracy. Not less than 93 per cent. of the cases of
congenital deaf-mutism possess deformities of the head, face, jaws, and
teeth. The mere fact of the exceedingly primitive structure of the
internal auditory mechanism has abnormal or defective hearing power as a
consequence. Many cases of congenital deaf-mutism owe their origin to
this, inasmuch as the auditory mechanism is not in a condition to
appreciate sound, even though the individual may not have been born deaf,
and the whole auditory apparatus subsequently degenerates. A mental
defect is sometimes superadded, thus aggravating the case. Upon general
principles, since deformities of the head, face, jaws, nose, antra,
vaults, &c., are common in neurotics and degenerates, stigmata of the
ear-bones must occasionally take place. From the complicated structure of
the ear, lesions must often result from such deformities. The deaf-mutism
here considered is the result of congenital conditions not produced by
disease. Dumbness may result from congenital defects of the tongue or
deformities of the larynx of an atavistic or a degenerate type, but
degeneracy rarely extends so deeply into the organism as in the case of
deaf-mutism. No greater error is committed than the confusion of deaf
mutism secondary to ear disease with the congenital type.
The most prominent reversional tendencies occur in the genitals. One very
common condition is retention of the testicles within the abdomen
(_cryptorchidism_), which has been already pointed out, and may represent
the last expiring trace of degeneracy. The testicles may, however, be
perfectly normal in structure and function. In the female the uterus may
present every type of mammalian uterus from the marsupial up. The female
may also revert (as more rarely the male) to the condition of the reptiles
and oviparous mammals in which the urinary organs and bowels empty into a
single opening, the cloaca. This condition has been found in the female
offspring of degenerate families, who are otherwise normal and who have
produced children, despite the cloaca.
Another reversion is the occurrence of breasts without nipples, resembling
those found in the oviparous mammals. The breasts in degenerates, as
already shown, are frequently multiple, sometimes because the law of
individuation is reversed, but more often as a reversion to the
many-breasted condition (_polymastia_) of the precursor of man.[236] The
human kidney and liver may revert not merely in function alone to the
sauropsida, but also in structure.
The human heart may present in degenerates all types from the pulsating
vessel found in the lancelet up to that of the mammal. The imperfect types
of these sometimes perform their functions properly, except under strain.
In other cases mixture of arterial and venous blood results, producing the
so-called "blue babies."
Under the teachings of the extreme disciples of Morel, it has been assumed
that the family of the degenerate tends to irrevocable extinction. On the
principle of individuation already outlined from Spencer, degeneracy,
through its tendency to generalise rather than specialise function, causes
too rapid development of cells which tend to extinguish each other, thus
preventing proper ovulation; and, in the next place, the same condition
prevents proper development of the ovum if formed and fecundated; and,
finally, causes too numerous simultaneous developments of ova, which would
tend to destroy each other. The same cause produces also premature
extrusion of ova. At the same time, however, under given conditions, this
principle also tends to produce reversions in type in the shape of too
frequently repeated and abnormally multiple births. It has been noted that
even the ancestors of those predisposed to phthisis have numerous families
and many children at a birth albeit most of these die ere reaching the
sixth year. Marandon de Monteyel[237] finds that multiple and frequently
repeated pregnancies often occur among the families of hereditary
lunatics. This has been corroborated by Kiernan[238] and Harriet C. B.
Alexander,[239] of Chicago, in connection with the hereditary lunatics in
Cook County. They found that 90 families of the hereditary insane averaged
11 children each. Six families had 5 children, 4 had 7 children, 8 had 8,
10 had 9, 14 had 10, 8 had 11, 4 had 12, 4 had 13, 4 had 14, 3 had 16, 3
had 17, 4 had 18, 3 had 19, 5 had 20, and 1 had 21 children, each. Twins,
triplets, and quadruplets were six times as frequent as among normal
families. Manning has found similar conditions among the hereditary insane
in Australia. Valenta, of Vienna,[240] has noted this also among
epileptics. He reports the case of an epileptic mother who had 36
children, including six twins, four times quadruplets, twice triplets. Her
daughter, also an epileptic, bore 32 children before she was 40, including
quadruplets twice, triplets four times, and twins once. Similar, though
less striking, statistics occur with other classes of degenerates with
proportionate frequency when the sterilising effect of certain diseases to
which they are specially liable is taken into account. The general
acceptance of the opinion as to large families being a test of advance in
evolution seems strange when the extent and force of the action of the
principle of individuation is taken into account, and when it is
remembered how prolific are the lower vertebrates as compared with the
higher.
The origin of tumours on the principle now adopted depends essentially on
that reverse of the principle of individuation, illustrated in plural
births.
One most striking expression of nutritive degeneracy is hæmophilia or the
diathesis of the "bleeders." This, as Potain has pointed out, is not met
with except in families which are subject to nutritive or graver
degeneracies. Dent has shown that definite mental peculiarities,
especially an inability (stronger than unwillingness) to tell the truth,
are especially common in bleeders.[241] Hæmophilia was frequently
encountered in the Valois[242] family, and has been met with in the
descendants of Ernest the Pious of Hanover. The condition, as Osler,[243]
of Baltimore, points out, is characterised by a tendency to uncontrollable
bleeding, either spontaneous or from slight wounds. The hereditary
transmission in this disorder is decided. In the Appleton-Swain family, of
Reading, Mass., there have been cases for nearly two centuries. Instances
have already occurred in the seventh generation. The usual mode of
transmission is through the mother, who is not herself a bleeder, but the
daughter of one. Atavism through the female is the rule. The daughters of
a bleeder, though healthy and free from any tendency, are almost certain
to transmit the disposition to the male offspring. The affection is much
more common in males than in females, the proportion being estimated at 11
to 1, or even 13 to 1. The tendency usually appears within the first two
years of life. It is rare for manifestations to be delayed until the tenth
or twelfth year. Families in all conditions of life are affected.
Bleeders, like other degenerates, may have large families; the members
usually have fine soft skin. In all probability, as the researches of Cohn
show, this condition is due to incomplete inhibition, resultant in
excessive activity of the blood-making organs. Such inhibition is, of
course, cerebral, and hence, as a later acquirement, readily affected by
degeneracy which may find its chief expression in this defect.
Among the conditions that have been recognised as an expression of
degeneracy is gout, which, as Fothergill long ago pointed out, is a
reversion to the condition found in the sauropsidian liver and kidneys.
Cullen had previously expressed the opinion that gout is a neurosis. Later
researches tend to show that this neurosis is one controlling nutritive
tissue change. The condition may occur early in childhood as well as at
the periods of stress. The same is true of conditions like arthritis
deformans, all of which may be the sole expression of degeneracy in an
individual who exhibits many marked stigmata. Another expression of
nutritive degeneracy is the senile atrophy of the skin described by
Souques.[244] In a case of this kind under my care the patient, a
twenty-six-year-old man, was born with club-foot. He has some musical
talent. He is a marked degenerate. The skin is thick, coarse, and dry,
giving him a very old appearance on account of its shrivelled condition.
The ears are undeveloped, eyes small and sunken; excessive development of
the cheek-bones; hair coarse and stiff; face arrested in development,
possessing a partial V-shaped arch. The width outside first molar is 2;
outside second bicuspid, 1·75; width of vault, 1·50; height of vault,
·58. One of the prominent features of degeneracy noticed in this case was
the lack of hair upon the face.
Disorder of the thyroid produces both dwarfing cretinism, and a
myxoedematous condition of the subcutaneous tissues, increasing the
quantity of the jelly-like material in these, and therefore approximating
some conditions found in the invertebrates. Ichthyosis (the skin disorder
producing the "fish men" of shows) is frequently an expression of
degeneracy, often associated with deficient limbs and monsters in the same
family.
[Illustration: FIG. 107.]
A condition due to heredity (involving an arterial change called
arterio-capillary fibrosis) underlies many disorders like cirrhosis of the
liver, kidneys, and other organs. It is usually an expression of
premature senescence. Certain families for this reason exhibit a tendency
to an early appearance of old age (Fig. 107), a tendency which, as Osler
remarks, cannot be explained in any other way than that in the make-up of
the machine bad material was used for tubing.
Obesity or lipomatosis is a nutritive expression of degeneracy especially
noticeable in the second dentition, at puberty, and sometimes at the
climacteric. As Féré has shown, lipomatosis (first noticed by Cruveilhier)
is an expression of stress at the period of evolution. Youthful obesity
occurs in descendants of degenerates. In my experience it is attended by
great liability to disease and systemic weakness when under morbid
influence. These lipomatosic children are liable to rheumatism (more
properly gout) and great hemorrhage from slight causes. Youthful obesity
is sometimes, as Féré remarks, associated with precocious maturity and
resultant early senescence, but more often with extended infantilism, as
in the case of Dickens's "fat boy."
In connection with this question of obesity I examined 267 corpulent
school children and adults. Nearly all had marked stigmata of degeneracy;
92 per cent. had deformed ears to a marked degree; 66 per cent. had
arrested development as compared with their age, while 12 per cent.
presented excessive development; 34 were too young to show the final form
and size of the jaw. Of the 34, in about 33-1/3 per cent., the molars,
incisors, cuspids and bicuspids were present; 96 per cent. of these had
small teeth. Of the remaining 233, 87 per cent. had arrested development
of the upper jaw, 22 per cent. of the lower jaw, 64 per cent. had V or
saddle-shaped arches or their modifications and protruding teeth; 17 per
cent. had hypertrophy of the alveolar process; 83 per cent. had small
teeth; 27 per cent. had extra tubercles upon the molars; 82 per cent. had
stenosis of the nasal cavity more or less marked; 36 per cent. had
deflection of the nasal septum to the left, and 29 per cent. to the right;
21 per cent. wore glasses for eye defects. In 58 per cent. there was
enlargement of the thyroid gland, and in 7 per cent. arrest of development
of the same.
[Illustration: FIG. 108.]
[Illustration: FIG. 109.]
[Illustration: FIG. 110.]
Among the structures of reversionary type that have attracted most
attention of late years is the appendix vermiformis. This, as elsewhere
shown, is a rudimentary offshoot which is extremely variable. Man retains
this structure as a relic of having been at one time a vegetable feeder.
In the koala (Australian native bear), a vegetable-feeding marsupial, it
is more than thrice the size of the body. In the carnivora it has entirely
vanished. In man, where it is sometimes absent and sometimes is as largely
developed as in the orang, it is commonly from four to five inches in
length and about a third of an inch in diameter. The appendix is poorly
supplied with blood, which predisposes it to attacks by microbes because
of the absence of leucocytes to fight these, and also because being, so to
speak, a blind ally of the intestine, microbes find in it a suitable
culture medium for them. The secretions of the appendix are very apt to
decompose: hence a culture medium. The extreme variability of this
disappearing organ may be judged from the Figs. 108, 109, 110. As it is
best developed in degenerates, it constitutes in them one source of
predisposition to death from blood poisoning or from sudden shock. The
location of this organ also tends to facilitate disease. In degenerates it
may be situated at any point upon the end of the big bowel, varying from
two to three inches. This little bowel is worse than useless in man, being
a source of serious danger. It is an instance of checked development of
the same kind which causes the human liver to take on sauropsidian
peculiarities. Man in this particular as well as the orang is lower than
the carnivora, who have lost this worse than useless organ. Its tendency
to disappearance in man indicates once more the truth that degeneracy of
an organ is often, through the law of economy of growth, for the benefit
of the organism as a whole.
I may conclude this outline of human reversionary tendencies by mentioning
that merycism, or rumination, has been very frequently found among
imbeciles, paranoiacs, hysterics, and epileptics.
CHAPTER XVI
DEGENERACY OF THE BRAIN
One illustration, and a very striking one, of the influence of degeneracy
on the brain is the durencephalous child which so often appears in
degenerate families. Here the cerebral hemispheres and everything but the
medulla and pons may be absent, while the rest of the body is in a
comparatively normal state of development. Starting with such an extreme
expression of degeneracy in the brain, a wide but closely linked range of
deficiencies may be found in the brain of degenerates, involving even in
some almost normal individuals more than simple deficiency. What was
pointed out by Spitzka,[245] of New York, twenty years ago concerning the
brain of hereditary lunatics, is equally true of the brains of the other
degenerate branches of the same tree. The conventional notion associating
idiocy and imbecility with quantitative deficiency of the forebrain only
is, as Spitzka remarked, a very imperfect one. The researches of numerous
observers have shown that qualitative defects (using the term qualitative
in its wider sense to cover both morphologic and histologic aberrations)
are as common, and are more characteristic features of the degenerate
brain. These defects may be enumerated under the following heads: 1.
Atypical asymmetry of the cerebral hemispheres as regards bulk. 2.
Atypical asymmetry in the gyral development. 3. Persistence of embryonic
features in the gyral arrangement. 4. Defective development of the great
interhemispherical commisure. 5. Irregular and defective development of
the great ganglia and of the conducting tracts. 6. Anomalies in the
development of the minute elements or neurons (as the cells and
associating of fibres are now generally called) of the brain. 7. Abnormal
arrangements of the cerebral vascular channels. All of these conditions,
separately or in the combination of several of the features above
mentioned, are occasionally found in the brain of paranoiacs, moral
imbeciles, criminals, deaf-mutes and other degenerates. Of the first type
the brain (Fig. 111), from the practice of Kiernan, is an excellent
illustration. This brain came from a paranoiac criminal who died in the
Chicago (Cook County) Insane Hospital. A very similar brain was observed
by Kiernan in one of the paranoiacs dying in the New York City Insane
Hospital. Similar brains have been observed in deaf-mutes[246] whose
mental status passed muster because of the allowance made for mental
deficiency due to deaf-muteness. A brain showing as great asymmetry was
found in the case of a French physician of standing who was a member of a
mutual autopsy society. He proved, however, to have had degenerates in his
ancestry and had exhibited peculiarities which showed that much of the
degeneracy due to this ancestry had been corrected by proper training. The
defects enumerated under Spitzka's second head are also observable in the
illustration given. The gyres are not only asymmetrical as to their number
in the two hemispheres, but also as to their size. The contrast between
this brain and the ideally normal one of the mathematician Gauss[247]
(Fig. 112) could not well be greater. Both of these as regards complexity
of gyres contrast very decidedly with both the foetal brain given by
Bastian (Fig. 113) and the idiot brain (Fig. 114) of a patient of Kiernan.
The persistency of embryonic features in the gyral arrangement is
excellently illustrated in Fig. 115, which represents the brain of an
imbecile examined by Spitzka. Here the convolutions in general were few,
large, and well marked.[248] The occipital and parietal lobes
preponderated in mass as compared with the temporal and frontal. The
latter were greatly hollowed out on the orbital face, and the gyri here
found were few, simple, and atypical. On the whole the convolutions of the
right hemisphere were better marked and the secondary folds more numerous
than those of the left hemisphere, and the type of the convolutions
presented differences on the two sides. The most pronounced differences
were exhibited in the island of Reil and in the occipital lobe. The island
of Reil on the left side had fewer and flatter gyri than that of the right
side, and resembled in its general aspect the first impression of the
brain of an orang-outang. The right island had six folds better marked
than those of the left side, but their type was more decidedly radiatory,
which was in relation with the unusual shortening of the insular field.
The external perpendicular occipital sulcus which Bischoff never found in
the adult human brain (but which has been found persistent in a case of
imbecility with moral perversion by Sander and in a sane neurotic
individual by Meynert) was finely marked upon the right side of the brain
under consideration. The fissure was very deep, its posterior wall was
slightly bevelled, and covered several secondary gyri of its anterior
walls. It differed in position from the similar fissures described by
Meynert and Sander in that it did not, as in these cases, unite with the
internal perpendicular occipital sulcus and thus simulate the arrangement
found in the anthropoid apes. It was merely the unobliterated external
occipital fissure of the embryo, and, as in the latter, its medial end if
prolonged would have fallen behind the internal perpendicular occipital
sulcus. The anomaly consisted therefore in the preservation of an
embryonic feature. The arrest of development involved the generally better
developed hemisphere. On the left side gyri and sulci were few and simple
but typical, the external perpendicular occipital sulcus being interrupted
by a broad crossing gyrus. On transverse vertical sections through the
hemispheres the average vertical thickness is found to be the same on both
sides and normal. The great ganglia were of relatively large dimension,
and the white mass of the hemisphere, aside from the internal capsule and
the other detachments mediating the connection of the cortex with lower
centres, relatively reduced. The caudate nucleus appeared to be of bolder
contour on the right side. The right lenticular nucleus presented a larger
section area by about 25 per cent. than its fellow of the opposite side.
It was much shorter, however, like the insular territory of the same side,
and in corresponding sections the posterior end of the left lenticular
nucleus was struck while the right was absent. The right nucleus was
rounder, the left more triangular in contour in corresponding altitudes.
The olivary bodies were asymmetrical, the right one being flatter and
smoother than the left. On transverse sections no difference between the
olivary nuclei beyond that which occurs in healthy persons could be found;
the asymmetry was ascertainably one of prominence only. There was one
morphologic appearance noticeable in the fourth layer of the paracentral
cortex. This consisted of the presence of round bodies comparable to the
nuclei of nerve cells within a thin or no mantle of protoplasm, and
presenting every gradation from the free nuclei of the neurolgia, so
called, to nerve cells with imperfect processes. These bodies in the human
cortex represent imperfectly developed nerve cells and are normally found
in the cortex of lower animals. The barren layer or ependyma of the cortex
was in places twice as thick in this brain as in the brain of normal
beings. This ependyma is the histologic factor of the enormous weight of
macrocephalic brains. In a macrocephalic case coming under the observation
of Kiernan, of Chicago, in which the brain weighed 68 ounces, the ependyma
was five times the normal thickness. The conditions to which Spitzka
refers are more or less constantly found in degeneracy. The readiness with
which any form of the degenerate series may undergo a metamorphosis into
another in the course of hereditary transmission is not, Spitzka remarks,
interpretable in any other light than that of the transmission of
structure defects either intensified or mitigated in the course of such
transmission.
[Illustration: FIG. 111.]
[Illustration: FIG. 112.]
[Illustration: FIG. 113.]
[Illustration: FIG. 114.]
[Illustration: FIG. 115.]
Transmission of many of these cerebral defects occurs at the moment of
conception. The embryonic mechanism of these defects, and the influence
which foetal and maternal impressions and injuries exert on the
development of the nerve centres, furnish valuable argument by analogy in
support of conclusions regarding the degeneracy group. Embryologists
imitate known natural teratological states of the nerve centres by
artificial methods. By wounding the embryonic and vascular areas of the
chick's germ with a cataract needle malformations are induced, varying in
intensity and character with the earliness of the injury and its precise
extent. More delicate injuries produce less monstrous development. It is
particularly the partial varnishing or irregular heating of the egg-shell
that results in the production of anomalies comparable to microcephaly and
cerebral asymmetry. The constancy of the injurious effect of so apparently
slight an impression as the partial varnishing of a structure not directly
connected with the embryo at all, suggests a most plausible explanation of
maternal and other impressions acting on the germ. The delicate problems
in this connection may be inferred from the observations of Dareste that
eggs transported in railroad cars, and thus subject to the vibration and
repeated shocks of a railroad journey, are checked in development for
several days. A less coarse molecular transmission taking place during the
maturation of the ovum or its fertilisation, or, finally, during the
embryonic stages of the more complex and hence more readily disturbed and
distorted human germ, would account for the disastrous effects of
insanity, emotional explosions, and mental or physical shocks of either
parent on the offspring.
For the majority of cerebral deformities the causes of the deformity must
exist in the germ prior to the appearance of the separate organs of the
body. Artificial deformities produce analogous results because they
imitate original germ defects either by mechanical removal or by some
other interference with a special part of the germ. Early involvement of
the germ is shown in the fact that the somatic malformation in degeneracy
often involves other parts of the body than the nervous axis: defective
development of the uro-genital system, deformities in the face, skull,
irregularities of the teeth, misshapen ears and limbs.
Those who seek for the source of the arrested or perverted brain
development in the reaction of an abnormally growing and ossifying skull
on the skull contents are in error. The premature ossification theory does
not hold good even for the microcephali; it is to be doubted if it ever
had any justification in view of the often open character of the sutures.
Taking the well-studied cases of asymmetry, the variability of a single
factor shows that caution is needed in referring cerebral anomalies to any
single influence. In Muhr's case (cited by Spitzka) the atrophic
cerebellar hemisphere was on the same side with the atrophic cerebral
hemisphere. The internal carotid artery of that side was of lesser calibre
and the entire skull half shortened. Here the lagging behind in growth of
one half of the skull appears on first sight to explain the retarded
development of the corresponding halves of the cerebrum and cerebellum. In
view of the atypy of the gyri, however, an atypy not to be explained
purely on mechanical grounds, it is more reasonable to believe that the
imperfect development of certain vascular channels was either concomitant
or secondary to a primitive anomaly of the cerebral hemisphere. The
retarded skull growth would have to be looked upon as a tertiary
occurrence and the cerebellar defect as a final ensuing result. Ordinarily
with defective development of one cerebral hemisphere the cerebellar
defect is on the opposite side, herein following the course of the
anatomical connections of that development and of the secondary
degenerations. The deviation from this rule in Muhr's case was due to the
entering of the abnormal skull-shape, itself secondary to other defects,
as an element influencing brain growth at a special period of development.
An abnormal shape of the skull, generally associated with a cerebral
defect, and hence valuable as a physical sign presumably indicating mental
anomalies, may exert an important modifying influence at a late period on
the contained brain, but the grosser defects in the cerebral architecture
must antedate the period of skull growth and be deeply planted as an
original intrinsic fault in the brain blastema itself. The researches of
His have shown how important for the definitive shape of the body and its
organs are the position of individual cells, the portion of the germ area,
the convexity and length of germ curves and the relative rate of growth of
different germ areas. And as the experiments of other embryologists have
established the possibility of producing monstrosities analogous to
cerebral defects by altering the conditions ever so slightly, the general
conclusion follows that the fundamental error of development at the
foundation of malformations associated with degeneracy is to be located at
a very early period of embryonic, or possibly of ovuline life. Certain of
these anomalies are due to a disturbance of the balance between the
growth of the epiblast and mesoblast derivatives of the brain, others to a
disharmony in the development of related associated brain segments; in the
severer cases both elements are combined.
It is not difficult to perceive the relation existing between a defective
brain weight, paucity of the gyri, deficiency of properly developed
cortical cells and such an elementary form of mental aberration as simple
imbecility. The subject of the relation between structure and function
gains in interest when we leave this domain of simple mental weakness to
analyse the relation between structural defects and the positive symptoms
of insanity and degeneracy--that is, moral perversion, mental obliquity,
delusions, and morbid impulses. Such symptoms are not limited to the
higher forms of the degenerate series; they occur, though less constantly
and less markedly, in the lower forms.
C. K. Mills,[249] of Philadelphia, on examination of imbecile, paranoiac,
and criminal brains, found atypical asymmetry as to gyral and fissure
development present. The features of this atypical asymmetry were the
existence of a Sylvian fissure shorter on one side than the other, both
absolutely and comparatively, and also a more vertical direction of the
fissure on one side than on the other, greater exposure of the insula on
one side with marked differences in the development of its fissures and
gyri, confluence of the central fissure with the Sylvian on one side only,
and great tortuosity or bridging of the former fissure in one hemisphere,
unusual narrowness, straightness of complication of the precentral or
postcentral gyrus on one side; marked difference in the simplicity of
complexity of the frontal lobes, great simplicity of the orbital surface
on one side, differences in the parietal fissure as to length and
interruption, a smaller parietal or marginal or angular gyrus on one side,
very great difference in the degrees of confluence and interruption of the
fissures in general, exceeding great length vertically of the
supertemporal or parallel fissure on one side, unusual differences in the
size of the precuneus and cuneus.
A. W. Wilmarth,[250] of Philadelphia, Pa., after a careful study of idiots
and imbeciles ranging in intellectual power from the idiot, properly
so-called, to the juvenile criminal, paranoiac, and "ne'er-do-well," finds
that the brains of these vary greatly along the line pointed out by
Spitzka and Mills. One type of brain in this class of children is very
simple in its outward configuration. The convolutions are usually coarse,
but little convoluted and comparatively free from secondary folds. The
fissures tend to assume a confluent type. Another variety, found chiefly
among the lowest grades, might well be termed "atypic." A brain without a
corpus callosum is a marked example. In the frontal lobe of the right
hemisphere the first frontal convolution is quite regular. Below this from
the centre of the lobe seven fissures passed in different directions,
cutting the tube into a number of radiating convolutions, entirely
different from its usual appearance. The short fissure of Sylvius (about
three inches in length) passed upward, turned sharply, and passed almost
directly behind. Two parallel gyri curved around its posterior extremity.
The arrangement of the convolutions of the temporal and parietal lobes
were so exceedingly irregular and complex that it was impossible to
classify them. In the occipital lobe, on the contrary, the gyri were
complete in number and of regular arrangements. In the left hemisphere the
arrangement of the frontal convolutions was more regular, but the temporal
and parietal lobes presented the same complicated area of surface folding,
bearing but little resemblance to the normal brain. The tendency of the
convolutions to arrange themselves in parallel curves around the posterior
extremity of the fissure of Sylvius was well shown in the brain of a boy
of exceedingly low intellect. The frontal lobes in this brain are
proportionately large; the convolutions straight, especially the third
frontal, the fissures shallow. In the left temporal lobe they are nearly
obliterated from pressure of fluid in the ventricles. The ascending
frontal convolution on each side appears to be wanting. On the left side a
large bridging convolution crosses the middle of the fissure of Rolando.
Confluence of fissure is a decided feature of idiot brains. Even where
confluence is not complete, the tendency of the principal fissure to cut
through separating convolutions is very evident. Were the cases where
confluence is nearly complete included, the number would be considerably
augmented. The fissure of Sylvius passed into the fissure of Rolando in
one case on both sides, in another on one side only. In two other cases
they were connected by deep secondary fissures. The interparietalis has
its origin in the fissure of Sylvius in four cases on both sides, in five
cases on one side only. The calcarine fissure passed completely across
the gyrus frontitatus on both sides in two cases, on one side in four
cases. In one case the first occipital convolution sank nearly beneath the
surface, the next occipital gyrus projecting over it, forming a parietal
operculum. There also seems to be a strong tendency to form annectant gyri
in the upper part of the parieto-occipital fissure. In no less than six
hemispheres of 15 brains were these supplementary gyri found more or less
complete. In one case on both sides, in five cases on one side, the
parieto-occipital fissure cut through the first occipital convolution into
the interparietal fissure. A tendency of the transverse occipital fissure
to approach the parieto-occipital fissure is very apparent, though in no
case do they coincide. The folds of the cerebral cortex, from a lack of
the stimulus of healthy growth, sometimes revert to forms resembling those
found in other groups of the animal kingdom.
The fundamental factors of thought and action, as Spitzka terms them, are
two: perceptions and motor innervation. These are, in other words, the
units of thought and action. They can be properly referred to nerve cell
groups as their anatomical seat, and, as far as intellect is in question,
to the cell group represented in the more or less diffused and dovetailing
areas of specialised function in the cortex cerebri (Fig. 116). But the
largest hemisphere known, with the most crowded and most highly developed
nerve cells, and the most extensive connections with the periphery, and
the most perfect projection of that periphery in its intricately
convoluted mass would, functionally speaking, represent nothing but a mass
of pigeon-holed impressions stored away without method and without
purpose, useless to the organism were it not for those arched fibres
uniting the different cortical centres with each other.
[Illustration: FIG. 116.]
These fibre constitute by far the greater part of the white centrum oval
of the hemisphere. The total transverse section of the crus and the fibre
masses from the thalamus and basilar ganglia, does not comprise more than
one-third of the entire mass. In the lower animal this relation is
different. The projecting fibres, such as those of crus and capsule and
the great ganglia, are not as massive as in man, but they are nearly equal
to, and in still lower forms exceed, those connecting the gyri with each
other. Hence the chief point of contrast noted on examining a transverse
frontal section through the cerebral hemisphere of a man and an ape
consists in the mass of the centrum ovale of Vieussens. The whole
substance in man actually appears hypertrophied when compared with that
of lower animals. It is the associating fibres which mainly mediate that
complex co-ordination of the separate units of thought and action which
constitute the anatomical basis of the highest mental functions (Fig.
117). The study of the human mind does not resolve itself merely into an
analysis of individual faculties such as simple perceptions and motor
innervations, but above all requires the establishment of their synthesis
into the complex abstractions on which the ego depends.
[Illustration: FIG. 117.]
Neither anatomic nor physiologic researches are calculated to demonstrate
just what associating fasciculi or what groups of such fasciculi are
subservient to any particular co-ordination. Where, for example, the
cortical area for vision overlaps that of the centre for forearm and hand,
the associating fasciculus underlying the debatable land is subservient to
the co-ordinations employed in writing and drawing. In like manner a
similar associating bond extending from the centre of auditory word
symbols to that of the tongue and lip centres may be considered a chief
factor mediating the speech co-ordinations. A child originally has no
adequate notion of distance or perspective, but will, in the first week of
life, grasp at objects fifty feet away. Its first ideas of space are
gathered from its own skin sensations; it learns to distinguish between
single impressions when touching foreign bodies, and associated double
ones as when it touches a part of its own body. In great part this may
even be accomplished by an active infant during the last months of
utero-gestation; it has learned thus to separate the conception of its own
body from the confused chaos which all impressions originally constitute
to the infant; the next lesson is to learn that to reach certain objects
it moves a certain distance, while others are immediately in reach. It
then discovers, therefore, that the discrimination by the eye is possible,
since intervening objects which it has learned to measure by its own body
or bodily movements as a gauge permit an approximate judgment of distance,
in aid of which comes experiment in the shape of time requirements, since
to go so far requires such time, while to go further requires a much
greater. The crude ideas of space at this time must involve areas in the
cortex devoted to motion and to general sensation situated in the Rolandic
region. Those devoted to visual impressions are largely situated in the
occipital region, and those devoted to time may be located in the frontal
lobes. Further analysis of the more elaborate sense of space possessed by
adults, involving the play of equilibrium and the appreciation of movement
and direction in foreign objects, shows that cortical areas situated in
nearly every part of the hemispheres are subsidiary to it and connected by
fibre tracts of different lengths and courses. It is evident, therefore,
that the mal-connection of cortical centres is at the root of various
tropho-neurotic, nervous, mental, moral and other perversions exhibited in
degenerates. Deformity and deficiency of the corpus callosum in some
degenerates is but an expression of general defect of associating tracts.
Convolutional aberration in others is but an expression of imperfect
development of end stations and fibre systems. All mental and moral
disturbances are associated with perversions of the functions of the
cerebral hemisphere, but the converse, that cerebral hemisphere lesions
only are the essential accompaniments of mental symptoms evinced during
life, is not true. Lesions of the pons, the crura, and thalami are
accompanied by more or less complete obliteration of consciousness,
blurring of the perception, confusion in the intellectual sphere, even
where the lesion is not of such a character as to disturb the neighbouring
ganglia by pressure. Two explanations are possible of this phenomenon.
Either the vaso-motor centre for the cortical vessels is under the control
of isthmus ganglia partially, and hence isthmus lesions by irritation or
destruction of the centre excite or paralyse the vascular tubes of certain
cortical districts, or pathologic interruption of the great nerve tracts
involves functional disturbance of cortical end stations. The first
explanation is applicable in cases where general and widespread
disturbance, somnolence, excitement, or depression are found. The latter
where the disturbance is partial in character. If all avenues of sensory
perception be closed unconsciousness in the way of sleep speedily follows.
Interruption of the perception tracts is followed by corresponding
phenomena, though less extensive when occurring in the isthmus territory.
That an irritative lesion in the line of the centripetal tracts can
influence cortical life is shown by thalamus lesions in which
hallucinations are sometimes present. Here the cause of the hallucinations
is in the lower centre, but the entry of these into the intellectual
sphere can take place only in the cortical termination of that tract,
since at this point only through the connecting associating tracts can it
become a part of the ego.
Meynert traced an enormous division of the crus directly to the frontal
lobe and the lenticular nucleus, and showed that this portion through the
transverse fibres of the pons was of necessity connected with the
cerebellum, and that far other functions are to be located in the cortex
than merely muscular innervation, visual and auditory perceptions. The
restiform columns derived from spinal fibres enter the cerebellum and
terminate chiefly in its hemispheres. The cortex of these hemispheres is
connected by radiatory fibres, with the dentated nucleus, which is a
recipient of fibres of the auditory nerve. The cortex of the cerebellar
hemisphere receives fibres both from the sensorial periphery of the body
and the semicircular canals. From this reception area the transverse
fibres of the pons originate and enter the crus. It is these which enter
the frontal lobe and lenticular nucleus. In no respect does man so much
differ from the ape as in the quantitative development of these
fasciculi. Their development is intimately associated with the mass of the
frontal lobe, and there is every reason for considering them the channel
of information of the equilibrium and possibly of the senses of space and
time, on which the scope of the mind is so closely dependent. Lesions in
these tracts may disturb these sensations, and the entire mental
architecture may totter with the withdrawal or weakening of so important
pillars. The congenital asymmetry of the peduncular tracts observed in
certain cases of mental and moral perversion are not without bearing on
the symptoms of those cases. And this explanation would be adjunct to the
principle of mal-development of the associating tracts here advanced in
explanation of other symptoms of these same states. It is a logical truism
that complex cerebral functions have a complex substratum. Nothing could
be more unphilosophical, for example, than to speak of "intellectual
cells" (Denkzellen) in the cerebral cortex. Simple elements can have but
simple functions; complex functions require a union of numerous simpler
elements in a complex structural combination.
Such symptoms as epileptic explosions are admittedly connected with no
demonstrable anatomical aberration, and yet when epileptic explosions of a
certain type are found associated with a cortical lesion they are to be
regarded as symptoms of that lesion. Morbid projects, delusions, and moral
perversion are simply functional perversions of a properly built cerebral
mechanism or the outcome of a visible structural defect. And when the
latter is palpably attributable to an error in development and occurs
with a certain constancy in similar cases, a fundamental relation must be
assumed between the defect and the general tenor of the symptoms.
There is a great difference clinically between the effect of congenital
and acquired lesions. When porencephaly (a deformity originally studied by
Heschl) dates from infantile or foetal life, imbecility is always present
during life; but where it is developed in the matured brain imbecility
does not necessarily result.
Deficiencies in the cerebral vascular system underlie the pathological
phenomena on the basis of infantile cerebral paralysis, and allied
hereditary and congenital states. The degenerate conditions in the spinal
cord are essentially those described by Spitzka as occurring in the brain.
Vascular states, either as to irregularities in the number of vessels or
in the vessels themselves, underlie, as in the case of the cerebral
palsies, hereditary ataxias and other congenital and hereditary spinal
cord disorders.[251]
CHAPTER XVII
DEGENERACY OF MENTALITY AND MORALITY
In the mental and moral degeneracies there is a complete transition from
the durencephalic monster through the microcephalus, the idiot, the
imbecile, and the feeble-minded to the mentally normal individual. Between
the feeble-minded and the normal individual occurs a group whose general
characteristics is, as was pointed out by Magnan, a disharmony and lack of
equilibrium, not only between the intellectual operations, properly
so-called on the one hand, and the emotions and propensities on the other,
but even between the intellectual faculties themselves. A degenerate may
be a scientist, an able lawyer, a great artist, a poet, a mathematician, a
politician, a skilled administrator, and present from a moral standpoint
profound defects, strange peculiarities and surprising lapses of conduct.
As the moral element--the emotions and propensities--is the base of
determination, it follows that these brilliant faculties are at the
service of a bad cause, of the instincts and appetites which, thanks to
the defects of the will, lead to very extravagant or very dangerous acts.
In other cases the opposite occurs. Degenerates of irreproachable
character show strange defects in their intellect. They often have a
feeble memory in certain directions. Sometimes they cannot understand
figures, or music, or drawing. In a word, an otherwise normal individual's
intelligence is lacking as regards certain faculties. The centres of
perception are unequally impressionable, unequally apt to gather together
impressions, only certain impressions are registered and leave durable
images; certain relations, certain associations between different centres,
are perverted or even entirely destroyed.
The mental stigmata of degeneracy, therefore, may be divided into those
involving the moral elements (in which case there is no very striking
intellectual disorder) and those involving the intellectual elements, in
which the conditions may be divided into states where intellectual
disorder alternates with periods of complete lucidity or with neuroses
(periodical insanity, neuroticism, hysteria, and epilepsy), and states in
which the intellectual disorder is a permanent quantity (paranoia,
one-sided genius, imbecility, and idiocy). Great as is the apparent gap
between idiocy and one-sided genius, on the one hand, and between idiocy
and crime, on the other, this gap is, as already stated, filled by
numerous closely interlinked forms, dependent on the proportionate removal
of checks (which the race has acquired during evolution) on the explosive
expressions of egotism and mentality. The removal of these checks is
dependent on the removal or weakening of the power of associating tracts,
to which reference has been made in connection with the degenerate brain.
The idiot, capable only of purely vegetative functions, who would perish
were food not placed far back in his mouth, is one step lower than the
normal infant, who is essentially, as has been remarked, an egotistic
parasite. On slightly increased development this idiot, with the powers of
a rather low animal, gains food and satisfies its instincts. These
instincts at this stage may manifest themselves in the explosive manner
characteristic of the undomesticated and non-social animals. With these
instincts may appear others which man has long lost; thus an idiot girl
(who was delivered of an infant when alone) gnawed through the umbilical
cord in the manner of animals, thus effecting separation and preventing
hæmorrhage. At still a higher stage the imbecile may manifest destructive
instincts, may steal without the signs of remorse displayed by a housebred
dog, or may kill without recognising the results of killing. The intellect
may be comparatively developed in certain imbeciles in comparison with the
ethical defects. For lack of proper associating fibres, the imbecile may
be unable to acquire those higher associations constituting the secondary
ego, in the most elevated sense. To this class ultimately belong the
instinctive homicides, torturers, sexual criminals and thieves, so
frequently found among the juvenile offspring of degenerate stock. In them
the primary ego is strong, and the restraints of the secondary ego, which
perceives the rights of others, weakened or completely absent. This class
forms the germ of the congenital criminal whom no discipline can tame, and
who is incapable of being taught the dangers of his procedures under the
law of the land. Between this class and the paranoiac there is at once a
curious likeness and distinction. The lack of proper associating powers
prevents the moral imbecile from recognising any rights of others. The
same lack in the paranoiac prevents him from recognising the force and
rights of other people in opinion. The moral imbecile has lost the
greatest acquirement of the race in evolution, that acquirement which
fully recognises the secondary ego in accordance with the sublime precept,
"Do unto others as ye would that they should do unto you."
For practical purposes the division of criminals given by Tyndall is
sufficient. Crime is essentially an anti-social factor, and violations of
law can be regarded as crimes only in proportion as they are anti-social.
The essential character of crime is its parasitic nature. Parasites, in a
general way, may be divided into those which live on their host, without
any tendency to injure his well-being (like the dermodex in the skin
follicules); those which live more or less at his expense, but do not tend
to destroy him; and, finally, those which are destructive of the
well-being of man and lack proper recognition of individual rights which
constitutes the essential foundation of society. The first type is
impurely represented by the idiots, imbeciles, lunatics, paupers by
deprivation, blind, crippled, senile, insane, and deaf mutes. Society,
either indirectly or directly, has been the source of the parasitic state
of many of these, and hence, as also in the case of law-made criminals,
such parasitism really takes nothing from society. The second class is
represented by prostitutes, sexual degenerates, paupers, and inebriates.
Some of these, however, could be put into the third class, among those
moral lunatics and criminals who fail to recognise that individual rights
constitute social order. Prostitutes, paupers, and inebriates have this in
common, that crime in them has taken the line of least resistance. The
great ethical defect in the prostitute is not lack of checks on explosive
sexual propensities so much as the use of these last as a method of living
by her wits. In essence prostitution is the expression of the criminal
tendency manifested by the confidence operator. The researches of
sociologists like Chaplain Merrick,[252] of the Millbank Prison, London,
show that at least one-half of the prostitutes leave their homes
voluntarily to take up a "life of pleasure." Pauline Tarnowsky[253] finds
that in Russia prostitution is crime in women taking the line of least
resistance. The prostitutes, like the other criminals, are divisible into
criminals on occasion (vice, monetary reasons, &c.), accidental criminals,
law-made criminals, weak-willed criminals, and insane criminals. The
proportion of the law-made and accidental criminals among the prostitutes
is much less than among other criminals, as Merrick has shown. Seduction
stands very low in the list of causes. The proportion of the occasional
criminal type is very large. Pauline Tarnowsky concludes from her
researches, which my own tend to verify, that the prostitute, as a rule,
is a degenerate being, the subject of an arrest of development, tainted
with a morbid heredity, and presenting stigmata of physical and mental
degeneracy fully in consonance with her imperfect evolution. C. Andronico,
of Messina, Italy, arrived some time previously[254] at the same
conclusions as those of Tarnowsky. Tarnowsky found that 44-1/3 per cent.
of the prostitutes had skull deformities, 42-2/8 face deformities, 42 ear
deformities, and 54 teeth deformities. Andronico found among 230
prostitutes the following anomalies: Flat nose, 20; handle-shaped ear,
35; vicious implantation of teeth, 10; convergent strabismus, 2; facial
asymmetry, 4; prognathism, 7; receding forehead, 35. Grimaldi, in a study
of 26 prostitutes, had similar results to those of Tarnowsky. Lombroso, in
an examination of 50 prostitutes, found exaggerated jaws, 27 times;
plagiocephaly, 23 times; nasal asymmetry, 8 times; exaggerated zygomæ, 40
times. Tarnowsky found that in 150 prostitutes, taken at random from those
answering to the necessary conditions (uniformity of race, ability to give
their family history and years of residence in licensed houses), there
were present signs of physical degeneracy in 87. Among the abnormalities
were oxycephaly, platycephaly, stenocephaly, plagiocephaly, and heads with
marked depression either at the bregma or the lambda. The majority had a
marked development of the external occipital protuberance; in an equal
number of virtuous women it was present but four times. These and other
anomalies were thus distributed among the 150 prostitutes: Malformation of
the head (oxycephaly, plagiocephaly, &c.), noticed in 62; development of
the occipital protruberance, 62; very receding foreheads, 18;
hydrocephalic, 15; various anomalies of the face (prognathism, asymmetry),
64; ogival palatine vault, 38; congenital division of palate, 14; vicious
implantation of teeth, 62; Hutchinson's and Parrot's teeth, 19; absence of
lateral incisors, 10; Morel ears, 16; defective ears (detached from head,
deformed, &c.), 47; anomalies of the extremities, 8.
In my researches in the same class, with the assistance of Harriet C. B.
Alexander and J. G. Kiernan, the subjects chosen were those committed to
the Chicago House of Correction. They are the least intelligent of
Chicago's professional prostitutes. The number examined was 30. As regards
the race they included 13 Celtic-Irish, 5 Irish-American, 3 Scandinavian,
1 German, 1 German-American, 2 American, 1 English-American, 1
Latin-Swiss, 2 Negro.
It should here be remembered that the "fine" system of Chicago places only
the "obtuse" class in the Bridewell. One was seventeen years old, two
eighteen years, one nineteen years, five between twenty and twenty-five
years, three between twenty-five and thirty, six between thirty and
thirty-five, five between thirty-five and forty-five, one was forty-six
years old, two were fifty-five, three sixty-one, and one sixty-five. There
were eighteen blondes, ten brunettes, and two negroes. Four were
demonstrably insane and one was an epileptic.
In sixteen cases the zygomatic processes were unequal and very prominent.
There were fourteen other asymmetries of the face. Three heads were
Mongoloid (one Irish-Celt, one Swiss, and one Scandinavian). There are
Mongoloid race types in the regions where all three come from. Sixteen
were epignathic and eleven prognathic. In one there was arrested
development of the lower jaw, and in four arrested development of the face
bones. The nose was abnormal in six. There were sixteen brachycephalic and
thirteen mesaticephalic skulls. There were no dolichocephalic skulls.
There were three with oxycephalic skulls, of whom one was a Celt, one a
German, and one a Scandinavian. There were eighteen dome-type skulls, of
whom seven were Irish-Celts, five Celtic-American, one English
Anglo-Saxon, one American Anglo-Saxon, and one German-American. There were
four tectocephalic skulls, of whom one was an Irish-Celt, one an
Anglo-Saxon American, and one a Scandinavian. There were three
platycephalic skulls, of whom two were Celts and one a Scandinavian. There
was a plagiocephalic German and a stenocephalic Celt. One skull had a
protuberance at the bregma. Twelve occiputs were flattened, and in four of
these there was no tubercle; eighteen had an enormously developed
occipital protuberance. The percentage of deformities of the jaws was
large. Twenty-nine had defective ears. Normal ears were present only in a
member of a family which had furnished one mother and two sisters to the
institution.
The direct hereditary history of prostitutes is excellently illustrated in
Marie Duplessis, idealised by Alexandre Dumas in _La Dame aux Camélias_.
Her paternal grandmother, who was half prostitute, half beggar, gave birth
to a son by a country priest. This son was a country Don Juan, a peddler
by trade. The maternal great-grandmother was a nymphomaniac, whose son
married a woman of loose morals, by whom a daughter was born. This
daughter married a peddler, and their child was Marie. She had the
confidence-operator tendencies of many of her class. She died childless,
early in life, from consumption.[255] With their ancestry, habits,
perverse instincts, prostitutes cannot be cured or reformed by the
enforcement of municipal ordinances. Though those of criminal and
congenital type be taken from their surroundings and placed where they can
earn an honest livelihood, they soon go back, voluntarily, to their old
mode of life.
An allied class, belonging to a still blacker phase of biology, are the
sexual perverts. The congenital form associated with the stigmata of
degeneracy, as already shown, is an expression of the defective line
whence the victim has sprung. The congenital types are, like the similar
types of the prostitute, victims of inherited defects. The sexual pervert
may be divided into precisely the same classes as other criminals. The
congenital type often links degenerate lunatics, epileptics, &c., with a
born criminal class.
Between the criminal and the insane is a debatable line occupied by moral
imbeciles, reasoning maniacs, &c. There are many insane persons in whom
the principal deviation from the normal consists in disorder of the moral
faculties. In most closer inspection generally reveals signs of
degeneracy. The seeming immorality is the striking factor of the case and
superficially the mind otherwise appears clear and rational by contrast.
As Krafft-Ebing has shown in these cases, the most striking features are
moral insensibility, lack of moral judgment and ethical ideas, the place
of which is usurped by a narrow sense of loss or profit, logically
apprehended only. Such persons may mechanically know the laws of morality,
but if such laws enter their conscience these persons do not experience by
any real appreciation, still less regard, for them. These laws to them are
cold, lifeless statements. The morally defective know not how to draw from
them motive for omission or commission. To this "moral colour-blindness"
the whole moral and governmental order appears as a mere hindrance to
egotistic ambition and feeling, which necessarily leads to negation of
the rights of others and to violation of the same.
These defective individuals are without interest for aught good or
beautiful, albeit capable of a sentimentality which is shallow cant. Such
persons are repellent by their lack of love for children or relatives, and
of all social inclinations, and by cold-hearted indifference to the weal
or woe of those nearest to them. They are without other than egotistic
care for questions of social life or sensibility to either the respect or
the scorn of others, without control of conscience and without sense or
remorse for evil. Morality they do not understand. Law is nothing more
than police regulation. The greatest crimes are regarded as mere
transgressions of some arbitrary order. If such persons come in conflict
with individuals, then, hatred, envy, and revenge take the place of
coldness and negation, and their brutality and indifference to others know
no bounds.
These ethically defective persons, when incapable of holding a place in
society, are often converted into candidates for the workhouse or the
insane hospital, one or the other of which places they reach after they
have been, as children, the terror of parents and teachers, through their
untruthfulness, laziness, and general meanness, and in youth the shame of
the family and the torment of the community and the officers of the law,
by thefts, vagabondage, profligacy, and excesses. Finally, they are the
despair of the insane hospital, the "incorrigibles" of the prisons, and
(Krafft-Ebing might have added) the veritable burdens of the poor-house.
If intellectual insanity or crime do not claim them, pauperism or
criminality is likely to be their destiny. The moral imbecile may,
however, keep within the law, and as in the instance of the "Napoleon of
Finance," cited elsewhere from Kiernan, may achieve business success. His
descendants often, however, evince degeneracy in an aggravated form. Many
of the supposed reformers of various alleged social evils are often of
this class. Their morbid egotism takes the direction of cant and
sentimentality, so common at certain states in evolution, as points of
least resistance. Like Guiteau, the assassin of President Garfield, they
aim at doing a "big thing for humanity and myself," the humanity being
concentrated in "my" ideas. The moral lunatic needs but a slight twist
intellectually to become the paranoiac in whom there is, as Spitzka has
pointed out,[256] a permanent undercurrent of perverted mental action
peculiar to the individual, running like an unbroken thread through his
whole mental life, obscured, it may be, for these patients are often able
to correct and conceal their insane symptoms, but it nevertheless exists,
and only requires friction to bring it to the surface. The general
intellectual status of these patients, though rarely of a very high order,
is moderately fair, and often the mental powers are sufficient to keep the
delusion under check for practical purposes of life. While many are what
is termed crochety, irritable, and depressed, yet the sole symptoms of the
typical cases of this disorder consist of the fixed delusions. Since the
subject matter of the delusion is of such a character that these patients
consider themselves either the victim of a plot or as unjustly deprived of
certain rights and position, or as narrowly observed by others, delusions
of persecution are added to the fixed ideas, and the patient becomes sad,
thoughtful, or depressed in consequence. The patient is depressed
logically, as far as his train of idea is concerned and his sadness and
thoughtfulness have causes, which he can explain, and which are intimately
allied with that peculiar, faulty grouping of ideas which constitutes the
rendezvous, as it were, of all the mental conceptions of the patient. Nay,
the process may be reversed, and the patient, beginning with a
hypochondriac or hysteric state, imagines himself watched with no
favourable eye. Because he is watched and made the subject of audible
comments (hallucinatory or delusional), he concludes that he must be a
person of some importance. Some great political movement takes place; he
throws himself into it, either in a fixed character that he has already
constructed for himself, or with the vague idea that he is an influential
personage. He seeks interviews, holds actual conversation with the big men
of the day, accepts the common courtesy shown him by those in office as a
tribute to his value, is rejected, however, and then judges himself to be
the victim of jealousy or of rival cabals, makes intemperate and querulous
complaints to higher officials, perhaps makes violent attacks upon them,
and being incarcerated in jail or asylum, looks upon this as the end of a
long series of persecutions which have broken the power of a skilled
diplomatist, a capable military commander, a prince of the blood, an agent
of a camarilla, a paramour of some exalted personage, or finally the
Messiah Himself. All through this train of ideas there runs a chain of
logic and inference in which there is no gap. If the inferences of the
patient were based on correctly observed facts and properly correlated
with his actual surroundings, his conclusions would be perfectly correct.
For years and years many such patients exhibit a single delusive idea as
the only prominent symptom. There is hereditary taint in most of these
subjects, who are strange in disposition from infancy. As children they
frequently shun society and indulge in day-dreams. Their bodily growth is
normal, but even trifling disease takes on a cerebral tinge. They may show
talent in special directions, but their intelligence rarely passes out of
the puerile stage. They often brood over a feminine ideal, a girl who has
never encouraged them, and whom they persecute with absurd plans of
marriage.
Connecting the paranoiac with the moral imbecile are the so-called
"reasoning maniacs." Here the intellectual power is less than either that
of the moral imbecile or of the paranoiac, twisted though the intellect of
the latter be. Loquacious or unusually taciturn, heedless or morbidly
cautious, dreamers, wearisome to all brought in contact with them,
capricious and unmitigated liars, their qualities are often, in a certain
manner, brilliant, but are entirely without solidity or depth. Sharpness
and cunning are not often wanting, especially for little things and
insignificant intrigues. Ever armed with a lively imagination and quick
comprehension, they readily appropriate the ideas of others, developing or
transforming them and giving them the stamp of their own individuality.
But the creative force is not there, and they rarely possess enough mental
vigour to get their own living. Passing without the slightest transition
from one extreme to the other, they felicitate themselves to-day on an
event which they sneered at the night before. In the course of a single
second they change their opinions of persons and things, novelty
captivates and wearies them almost in the same instant. They sell for
insignificant sums things they have just bought, in order to buy others
which, in their turn, will be subjected to like treatment; and, strange to
say, before possessing these objects, they covet them with a degree of
ardour only equalled by the eagerness they exhibit to get rid of them as
soon as they become their own. To see, to desire, and to become
indifferent are three stages which follow each other with astonishing
rapidity.
The intense egotism of these persons makes them, as W. A. Hammond remarks,
utterly regardless of the feelings and rights of others. Everybody and
everything must give way to them. Their comfort and convenience are to be
secured though every one else is made uncomfortable or unhappy; and
sometimes they display positive cruelty in their treatment of persons who
come in contact with them. This tendency is especially seen in their
relations with the lower animals.
Another manifestation of their intense egotism is their entire lack of
appreciation of kindness done them or benefits of which they have been the
recipients. They look upon these as so many rights to which they are
justly entitled, and which in the bestowal are more serviceable to the
giver than to the receiver. They are hence ungrateful and abusive to those
who have served them, insolent, arrogant, and shamelessly hardened in
their conduct toward them. At the same time, if advantages are yet to be
gained, they are sycophantic to nauseousness in their deportment towards
those from whom the favours are to come.
The egotism of these people is unmarked by the least trace of modesty in
obtruding themselves and their assumed good qualities upon the public at
every opportunity. They boast of their genius, their righteousness, their
goodness of heart, their high sense of honour, their learning and other
qualities and acquirements, and this, when they are perfectly aware that
they are commonplace, irreligious, cruel, and vindictive, utterly devoid
of every chivalrous feeling, and saturated with ignorance. They know that
in their ratings they are attempting to impose upon those whom they
address and will even subsequently brag of their success.
It is no uncommon thing for the reasoning maniac, still influenced by his
supreme egotism and desire for notoriety, to attempt the part of reformer.
Generally he selects a practice or custom in which there really is no
abuse. His energy and the logical manner in which he presents his views,
based as they often are on cases and statistics, impose on many people,
who eagerly adopt him as a genuine overthrower of a vicious or degrading
measure. Even when his hypocrisy and falsehood are exposed he continues
his attempts at imposition, and when the strong arm of the law is laid
upon him, he prates of the ingratitude of those he has been endeavouring
to assist, and of the distinctiveness and purity of his own motives.
Closely akin to that instability of inter-association resulting in loss of
proper checks on action in the types just described, is the sentimentalism
which often covers real hardness, but which charms and allures the mass.
This has essentially the same psychological basis as the suspicional
tendencies and pessimism with which it is so often associated. Suspicional
tendencies arise from states of anxiety resultant on instability of
association, dependent on lack of associating fibres. Pessimism (so
frequently present in the otherwise healthy degenerate) is often, as
Magalhaes has shown, nervous instability with alternations of irritability
and prostration. The subject is supersensitive; impressions call forth
intense and prolonged reactions followed by exhaustion. The state is
characterised by a general hyperæsthesia, which naturally results in an
excess of suffering. From instability and hyperæsthesia results discord
between the feelings themselves, between the feelings and the
intelligence, between the feelings, the ideas and volitions. Discord
between the feelings shows itself in a great variety of paradoxes,
contradictions, and inconsistencies. To the pessimist possession of a
desired object does not atone for former privation. Pain or unsatisfied
desire is replaced by the pain of _ennui_. With inability to enjoy what he
has are coupled extravagant expectations regarding that which he does not
have. He is extremely susceptible both to kindness and to contempt. He
passes suddenly from violent irritability to languor, from self-confidence
and vanity to extreme self abasement. His intense sensitiveness results in
intellectual disorders. For this involves a great vivacity of the
intuitive imagination, which favours the setting up of extravagant ideals,
lacking in solid representative elements. Hence a gap opens between his
ideal and the actual. He can never realise the ideal he pursues and so his
feelings are of a sombre hue. From this excessive realism results a state
of doubt, a certain distrust of all this rational objective knowledge. It
assumes another form in extreme subjectivism. The pessimist is haunted by
images of the tiniest religious scruples, suspicions, fears, and
anxieties, resulting in alienation from friends, seclusion, misanthropy.
The pessimist is further characterised by an incapacity for prolonged
attention, a refractory attention and a feeble will. These result in
inaction, quietism, reverie, self-abnegation, abolition of the
personality, annihilation of the will, amounting sometimes even to poetic
or religious ecstasy. Pessimism is frequently associated with a morbid
fear of death. The tramp is one phase of the degenerate in whom the
restless wandering tendencies of the neurasthenic and paranoiac are added
to the parasitic tendencies of the pauper, and the suspicional egotism of
the "reasoning maniac."
The one-sided genius is a link between the neurotic, the epileptic, the
paranoiac, the hysteric, and the imbecile. Cases crop up in which all
these elements are so mingled as to create a puzzle where they shall be
placed. In some cases, in accordance with the general law that physiologic
atrophy is accompanied by hypertrophy in other directions, the
intellectual powers other than along certain lines may be remarkably
deficient. Moreover, the intellectual power due to healthy atavism is
increased by the degeneracy in certain directions. Without going into the
question, raised by Lombroso,[257] as to genius being an epileptoid
neurosis, sufficient evidence exists to show that ill-balanced genius
often coexists with defects in a large number of directions. The
coexistence of genius with imbecility and even idiocy has been well
illustrated by Langdon Down, who cites numerous instances thereof.[258]
Defect in genius, whether of the imbecile stamp or otherwise, accompanied
by deficiency, is not expressed in the genius, but in its deficient
accompaniment. Even the mental instability of the highest type of
defective genius is closely akin to that of the neurotic.
The hysterics, as has been shown by Des Champs,[259] are neurotic women in
whom an aggravated sensibility exists. Neurotic women are divisible into
three categories according to the predominance of one of three
centres--cerebral, genital, and neuropathic. These types may be pure or
intermixed. The general characteristics are an absolute want of
equilibrium in sensibility and will power. There exists mobility of humour
in direct relation with facile impressionability to external influences or
to internal states. The nerves vibrate to all sentiments coming from
within or without, and all are registered without proper relation. One
fact chased by another is forgotten. Another produces a momentary
hyperexcitation, which takes place of the truth, whence it is that
falsehood is instinctive, but the patient protests her good faith if
accused of the same. This lack of equilibrium leads to a decided
modification of the mental faculties. Intellectual activity is over
excited, but in diverse degrees and variable ways, according to the
particular tendencies adopted. Absorbed by a preoccupation or controlled
by an idea, they become indifferent to all else. Their ideas are abundant,
and they rapidly pass from the idea to the act. Their vivid imagination,
coupled with a bright intelligence, gives them a seducing aspect, but
their judgment is singularly limited, attenuated, or false. They judge
from a non-personal standpoint excellently. They are quick at discovering
the faults of even their own relatives, but faults rightly attributed to
themselves are repudiated. Their memory is capricious. They forget their
faults and their acts under impulse, albeit these may be consciously done.
The cerebral type is led by the intelligence. She has little or no
coquetry; what coquetry there may be is the result of intention and
temporary. There is an ethical sense, frankness and nobility in her ideas,
disinterestedness and tact in her acts, and she is capable of friendship.
Her tastes carry her to male pursuit, in which she succeeds. She becomes
often what is called a "superior woman," and too often what is called an
"incomprehensible woman." She has but little guile. To the sensual type
voluptuousness is the aim of life and the centre of her acts and thoughts.
She is well endowed with guile and extremely diplomatic. She is full of
finesse, but not very delicate. Her lack of scruple often spoils her tact.
She is ruseful, dissimulating, and unconsciously mendacious. She despises
friendship and needs watching. If circumstances permit she loses all
delicacy, reserve and modesty. She is destitute of scruples. Her crimes
are coolly remorseless. The neuropathic type is one to which the
grasshopper is a burden. Her nerves are always on edge. She is a heroic
invalid who displays the air of a martyr about trivialities.
The character of the neurotic, as Kiernan remarks, recalls the observation
of Milne-Edwards concerning the monkey character. Levity is one of its
salient features, and its mobility is extreme. One can get it to shift in
an instant from one mood or train of ideas to another. It is now plunged
into black melancholy and in a moment may be vastly amused at some object
presented to its attention.
Neuroticism in man differs in no respect from that in woman except that
anæsthesia, paralysis of emotional origin, and conscious convulsions are
less common. The male neurotic could be subdivided precisely as Des Champs
has the hysteric. Neurotics are often long-lived, peculiarly resistant to
certain acute and fatal disease, and are frequently retentive of their
youthful appearance, which is to a certain extent an evidence of their
resistance to the wear and tear of life and advancing old age, and due to
emotional anæsthesia. Recognition of the neurotic tendency often induces
the individual to take better care of himself. The youthful appearance may
be due largely to arrest of facial development at an early age, the face
thus retaining the child character throughout life. Considering,
therefore, this class of neurotics, which does not include those afflicted
with the more serious nervous disorders such as epilepsy, they may be
looked upon as the victims of evolutionary processes that are constantly
going on in the race and under civilised conditions.
Neurotics are not met with to any extent among barbarous races, but are
numerous in civilised communities, where the weak are preserved from early
death and then subjected to the struggle for existence. Neurotics are
individuals naturally imperfect in some directions, but by the law of
economy of growth they are often superior in others. Their disordered
nervous functions and hyperæsthesia are not, necessarily, indicative of
inferiority of general organisation compared to their ancestry. They may
simply imply a more rapid advance in some one direction in the development
of the nervous system than can be kept up with by the remainder. These
defects may in some cases be the advance guards in the progress of the
development of the race.
As the nervous system controls nutrition in all departments of the
organism, anomalies occur with erratic nervous functions in such
individuals. In these neurotics are often found defective development
involving the bony and other structures. They have fine and delicate
features, small jaws and defective teeth. These are the results of general
systemic modifications connected with the neurotic state. The arthritic
diathesis occurs also; it is one of the underlying conditions of many
neurotic manifestations, often responsible for acquired bony deformities,
not infrequently involving the jaws to some extent.
Neurotic degenerate symptoms from a mental standpoint are noticeable long
before deformities of the osseous system are developed. They show
themselves in mental weakness, extreme stupidity, and precocity. Under the
first class the child is obstinate, quarrelsome, malignant, even immorally
inclined, and is often spoken of as being wicked or vicious. Harriet C. B.
Alexander[260] says the ruling instinct in the child of three or four is
self-gratification. It destroys what it dislikes. Among the earliest
manifestations of morbid mental activity in childhood are hallucinations,
which depend on already registered perceptions.
In many instances even moral agencies produce sudden explosions of mental
disorders. The inherited tendencies of childhood predispose to these
attacks. As Clouston has shown, neuroses and psychoses not requiring
hospital treatment are by no means uncommon in the too sensitive child
with hereditary taint. Children of this class have crying fits and
miserable periods on slight or no provocation. As Clouston has also shown,
precocity, over-sensitiveness, unhealthy strictness in morals and religion
for a child, or too vivid imagination, want of courage, thinness and
craving for animal food, are common characters. These children are
over-sensitive, over-imaginative, are too fearful to be physiologic, and
tend, as a general thing, to be unhealthily religious, precociously
intellectual, and at first hyperæsthetically conscientious.
The other class of children, as a rule, are very handsome babies and
children. The brightness is noted by parents at a very early age, and they
extol their many clever qualities and sayings. The tendency is for the
parents to cultivate these precocious qualities and believe it to be the
proper thing to encourage them; while in early life this class may possess
the peculiarities of the other class and also show those of degeneracy.
These children are the best scholars in the schoolroom and learn their
lessons with apparently little or no study. They are usually thin, frail
children, and very nervous. Very little food is taken and much of that is
not assimilated. Especially is this true of the lime salts, which form
bone and tooth structure. These lime salts are excreted through the
kidneys and salivary glands. This is easily demonstrated by an examination
of urine, mouth, and teeth. Large collections of tartar are always found
in these cases. Children of both classes are sure to show stigmata of
degeneracy. This period of degeneracy commences at the sixth year, or at
about the time the first period of brain development ceases. The bulk of
the brain has obtained its growth. In some the child commences to improve
mentally very fast. In others mental development is slow. In still others
it ceases altogether. From the time the second set of teeth begins to
develop until the twelfth year, neuroses of development and stigmata of
degeneracy are stamped upon the head, face, nose, jaws and teeth, and
later any of the conditions mentioned under the heads of nutritive
degeneracy and local perversion tendencies may appear.
Closely akin to these states are expressions of degeneracy manifesting
themselves with some approach to regularity in periods, as in epilepsy and
the periodical insanities. The periodical insanities may be simply
emotional states of exaltation (as in mania), of extreme depression (as in
melancholia), of stupor, or of mental confusion. They may show themselves
in periodical acts, as in dipsomania. This condition differs from the
condition called inebriety in the fact that it is a periodical expression
of degeneracy whose form has been accidently determined, but which would
exist even were its form changed. The differences are excellently outlined
by Dana,[261] who divides intemperate drinkers into four classes:
Periodical inebriates or dipsomaniacs, pseudo-inebriates, common drunkards
and victims of delirium inebriosum. The disease in the first class is a
periodical insanity. In the pseudo-inebriates the desire for drink is
only one of many manifestations of a weakened constitution or inherently
unstable nervous system. The third type are those which approximate the
occasional criminals. Another periodical insanity is kleptomania, in which
insane stealing occurs at intervals of greater or lesser regularity.
Nymphomania or satyrasis is a periodical insanity in which there is an
insane impulse for sexual intercourse. Pyromania is a periodical tendency
to commit arson. All of these periodical conditions may occur alone or in
combination with other degeneracies.
Closely related to the periodical insanities are the epileptic states
which play so large a part in many of the phenomena presented by the
degenerates. In the epileptic the mental rather than the gross nervous
expression merits attention. From what has already been said about
epilepsy, it and the periodical insanities are in no small degree the
effect of mal-development of the fore brain as compared with the centres
of organic life. The great convulsive centre is, according to
Spitzka,[262] the reticular grey matter of the brain isthmus, particularly
of the pons and medulla. All characteristic features of the full epileptic
onset can be produced in animals deprived of the related cerebral cortex.
It needs but a slight puncture with a thin needle to produce typical
convulsions in the rabbit, and some of the convulsive movements reported
by Nothnagel have not only shown the true epileptic character but also
that peculiar automatism noted in aberrant attacks. It is in this segment
of the nervous system that all the great nerve strands conveying motor
impulses, both of a voluntary and automatic and some of a reflex
character, are found united in a relatively small area, and just here a
relatively slight irritation might produce functional disturbances
involving the entire bodily periphery.
The experiments of physiologists have shown that if a sensory irritation
of a given spinal nucleus be kept up, after having produced a reflex
movement in the same segment, any reaction beyond the plain of that
segment is not in the next or succeeding planes but in the medulla
oblongata. The motor reaction then manifests itself in laughing, crying,
or deglutitory spasms, and, if the irritation be of the severest kind,
epileptic or tetanic spasms in addition. Now the occurrence of laughing,
crying, or deglutitory spasms could be easily understood if the molecular
oscillation induced by the irritation were to travel along the associating
tracts from the given spinal segment to the nuclei of the medulla
oblongata. For in the medulla are found the nerve nuclei which preside
over the facial, laryngeal and pharyngeal muscles. It is not easy at first
to understand how tetanus and epilepsy, that is, spasms consisting in
movements whose direct projection is not in the medulla oblongata but in
the cord, can be produced by irritation of the former.
There are scattered groups of nerve cells in the medulla oblongata which
have either no demonstrable connection with the nerve nuclei, or are
positively known to be connected with the longitudinal associating
strands. These cells hence can safely be regarded as representing a
presiding centre over the entire spinal system. No spinal centre exerts
any influence even remotely as pronounced as that of the entire cord.
This applies to man and other mammals. That the elaboration of the
medullary centre was as gradual a process as that of other higher
differentiations is illustrated by the case of the frog, whose medulla has
acquired the faculty of reproducing general spasms while the spinal cord
itself retains this property also; hence here the predominance of the
medulla is not so marked as in mammals.
The reticular ganglion of the oblongata is not in the adult a part of the
central tubular grey matter, but has, through originally developing from
it in the embryo, become ultimately isolated from its mother bed. It
constitutes a second ganglionic category, and the association fibres
bringing it in functional union with the spinal grey (first category) in
lower animals and shown to have assumed the position of projection fibres
in the higher, constitute a second projection tract; both together are a
second projection system. The scattered grey matter of the medulla has
great importance. Anatomically it is (though its cells be scattered
diffusely as a rule) a large ganglion with numerous multipolar cells of
all sizes, many of them gigantic, sometimes exceeding the so-called motor
cells (which they simulate in shape) of the lumbar enlargement in size.
Scattered in the "reticular substance" of the medulla from the upper end
of the fourth ventricle to the pyramidal decussation, they merit the
collective designation of reticular ganglia.
The cells of the reticular formation are known to be connected with the
nerve nuclei, on the one hand, and with longitudinal fasciculi, which,
since they run into the cord, terminate either in the grey matter or the
nerve roots directly, for nerve fibres do not terminate with, as it were,
blind ends. Now in the mammalian brain the reticular ganglion lies
scattered among fibres which come from the higher centres, and the
interpellation might be made whether, after all, the reticular ganglion be
not a mere intercalar station for fibres derived from a higher source.
Originally the ganglion was an independent station. In reptiles this body
of cells is too considerable to account for a termination in them of the
few cerebral fibres possessed by these animals. And, on the other hand,
the vertical strands are notably increased in their passage through the
field of the medulla oblongata.
The medulla oblongata with its reticular ganglion seems to be the great
rhythmic centre. In fish the movements of the operculum and mouth, in
sharks those of the spiraculum, in perenni-branchiate amphibians the
branchial tree, in the infant the suctorial muscles, in all vertebrates
the movements of deglutition, of the heart and respiratory muscles, all
movements presenting a more or less regular rhythm, are under the control
of the medulla oblongata. The early differentiation of this part of the
cerebro-spinal axis is related to the manifestations of rhythmic movements
in the embryo and their predominant importance in lower animals. The
possibility should not be excluded that a rhythmic movement may be spinal,
nay even controlled by peripheral ganglia (heart of embryo). A higher
development, however, implies the concentration of rhythmic innervations
at some point where that anatomical association may be effected which is
the expression of the mutual influence these movements exercise among
themselves.
Two sets of phenomena must be borne in mind in studying the physiological
pathology of the epileptic attack. First, the condition of the epileptic
in the interval. Second, the explosion itself. Too much attention is paid
to the last, too little attention to the first. The constitutional
epileptic is characterised by a general deficiency of tone associated with
exaggerated reaction and irritability. Thus the pupils are at once widely
dilated and unusually mobile. The muscular system, though generally
relaxed, manifests exaggerated reflex excitability. The mental state is
characterised at once by great indifference and undue irascibility. In the
same way the vascular system is depressed in tone in the interval with
rapid marked changes under excitation. The state of the nervous system as
a whole Spitzka forcibly compares to that of an elastic band which, being
on the stretch continually, is apt to rebound violently when one end is
let go. Under normal circumstances the band is less stretched and hence
not as liable to fly so far when the check is removed.
An irritation which, in health, produces restlessness of the muscular
system, accelerated respiration and pulsation and various mental phenomena
within the normal limits, in the epileptic results in more intense
phenomena in the same direction. The nervous irritability of the epileptic
manifests itself in one direction especially. An important vaso-motor
centre for the brain vessels exists, possibly diffused through an area
somewhere between the thalamus and subthalamic region above the pyramidal
decussation below. The irritability of this centre results in sudden
arterial spasm in the carotid distribution (so characteristic a feature of
the fit onset); simultaneously with the contraction of the vessel the
pupil undergoes an initial contraction, and relaxation instantly results
in both cases. The sudden interference with the brain circulation produces
unconsciousness, and destroys the checking influence of the higher centres
on the reflexes in a manner analogous to any shock affecting the nerve
centres. In the meantime, while there has been a sudden deprivation of
arterial blood and a sinking of intracranial pressure so far as the great
cerebral masses are concerned, there has been as sudden an influx of blood
to the unaffected district of the vertebral arteries whose irrigation
territory is now the seat of an arterial hyperæmia. The result of this is
that the great convulsion centre, the medulla, being over-nourished,
functional excess, that is, convulsion, occurs unchecked by the cerebral
hemispheres, which are disabled by their nutritive shock. The
unconsciousness and coma of epilepsy more resemble shock than they do
cerebral anæmia or syncope. The impeded return circulation of venous blood
now comes into play. The contraction of the neck muscles explains this
obstruction and especially the accumulation of venous blood in the
cerebral capillaries of the medulla.
True epilepsy presents an enormous number of sub-groups, exhibiting every
variety of deviation from the ideal convulsive form, and the existence of
these forms tends to demonstrate the views just expressed. In ordinary
petit mal the initial arterial spasm has but to be confined to the surface
of the hemispheres, leaving the thalamus ganglia undisturbed, and it can
readily be understood how the momentary unconsciousness or abolition of
cortical function can occur without the patient falling, his automatic
ganglia still carrying on their functions. At the same time with the
lesser spasm there would be a less extensive sinking of intracranial
pressure with less consecutive collateral hyperæmia of the lower centres
and therefore no convulsion.
In certain cases the arterial spasm fails to affect the entire cortical
surface simultaneously; some one trunk may be more pervious, and as afflux
of blood may occur in its special field where certain impressions and
motor innervations are stored, the result will then be that the function
of the relatively well-nourished territory will be exalted. If it be a
visual perception territory, sights, colours or luminous spectra will be
seen; if it be an olfactory territory, odours will be smelt; if a tactile
centre, crawling, tingling and cold sensation are felt; if a speech
centre, cries, phrases, and songs may be observed. This explains the
manifold epileptic aura, which is simply an isolated, exaggerated, and
limited cortical function. The recurrence of the aura is readily
explicable on the ground of the well-known physiological law that any
nervous process, morbid or normal, having run through certain paths, those
paths will be the paths of least resistance for that process to follow in
the future.
These conditions will be greatly exaggerated in proportion to the
deficiencies in the associating tracts and will often, in turn, pervert
these. The sexo-religious and other mental states of epilepsy often
closely mimic normal mentation and serve to disguise the intense depth of
degeneracy which epilepsy implies.
In their explosive, unchecked character the morbid restlessness of the
neurotic, hysteric, and criminal depend upon like brain disorder to that
of the epileptic, except that consciousness is not involved, and with
conscious acts are intermingled those preceding from the lower automatic
processes described. Consciousness, however, is sometimes lost in part,
whence frequently the defects so often noticed in the thoughts of the
degenerates.
The two following cases which have come to my notice illustrate the
obliteration of the function of limited areas of the brain. A young lady,
aged 22, of refinement and highly accomplished, was engaged to be married.
One evening her _fiancé_ called; she failed to recognise him and he
remained ever after a stranger to her. In every other respect her mind was
seemingly normal. She died of tuberculosis. In another case a young lady,
an expert stenographer, while riding her wheel, fell striking her head
against a stone. She remained unconscious for some days, and was quite ill
for three or four months. After her recovery she was much surprised to
find that she knew nothing about her former employment, although her brain
was perfectly normal in other respects.
CHAPTER XVIII
CONCLUSIONS
Since, as Weismann[263] admits, interference with the nutrition of the
germ plasm will result in the production of variations, the fact is
evident that even according to the Weismannian principle the nutrition of
the parents will determine the power of the embryo to pass through the
various embryonic stages up to the developed child. Impairment of
nutrition may check this development at any standpoint, and may thus
produce any or all of the defects due to degeneracy. Weismann has no doubt
about the inheritance of a "tuberculous habit whose peculiarities are
certainly transmissible." Practically, therefore, even according to
Weismann, that most emphatic critic of the transmission of hereditary
defect, a condition of nervous exhaustion is produced in the parents which
may be transmitted as a whole to the offspring, or may simply so affect
the ovum as to produce various arrests in development with hypertrophies
elsewhere. The influence of nervous prostration in the father may be
overcome by conditions in the mother tending to help development. As her
share in the germ plasm is most emphatic, not only at the time of the
formation, but also during the entire development of the embryo,
production of degeneracy will largely depend on her nutrition. The
influence of healthy atavism is much more emphatically exerted through the
female, albeit even in the male it may overcome the nervous exhaustion of
the ancestor so far as reproduction of it is concerned.
While many are called, few, owing to healthy atavism, are therefore chosen
for complete degeneracy. Although heredity plays a large part in the
degeneracy of the individual, still environment in many cases exerts a
greater influence in determining, according as it strengthens or weakens
healthy atavism, the depth of degeneracy. Treatment, therefore, both of
the individual and of the family is largely a question of prophylaxis or
prevention.
In prophylaxis of the family the first indication is to stop the
production of degenerates. Two measures have attracted considerable
attention, and from their seeming simplicity have met with much favour.
The first is regulation of marriage. This, as a means of preventing
degeneracy, has been much over-estimated. Laws claiming to regulate
marriage have ignored two factors. In the first place the graver
degeneracies only are taken into account. From what has been shown as
regards the tendency of the degenerate to intermarry, and from the fact
that restraints on marriage inevitably result in illicit relationships of
permanent character (equally productive of degenerates whose defects have
been increased by the condition in which they are born), the only
procedure likely to be of value in this relation is to regard marriage
simply as a contract designed for certain ends and permit its annulment
for fraud, for concealment of defects (intentionally or otherwise)
incompatible with the procreation of healthy children. In its essence this
is the English common law theory. Its principle is recognised by the
divorce codes of various continental European countries. Furthermore, it
is on this principle that the Pope not infrequently annuls marriages,
divorce not being recognised by the Church of which he is the head. It is
certainly best for the stability of the family that unhealthy unions
should have the least permanency possible.
Another element in prophylaxis, castration, ignores completely the rights
of individuals under the English common law (and, so far as the United
States is concerned, a provision of its constitution). Although
sacrificing these important guards against that degeneracy in the body
politic which inevitably reflects itself in degeneracy in the individual,
this procedure fails to accomplish its end, since it ignores completely
the principle of transformation in heredity. The distance between the
criminals (whom it is proposed to castrate) and the hysteric offspring of
good family is not so great that the progeny of one will not be as
degenerate as the progeny of the other. Whatever may be said of the value
of this procedure as a deterrent, its use as a prophylactic is
comparatively small.
Much better results are obtainable by guarding women from the factors of
degeneracy during puberty and during matronhood. Many nations whose laws
ostentatiously regulate marriage in a manner most oppressive to individual
liberty entail by their customs over-work in a spasmodic manner during
puberty and during matronhood. Nations whose customs permit women and
dogs to be harnessed together as beasts of burden, to carry the hod and to
dig trenches for sewers, gas, and waterpipes, cry out very loudly against
the dangerous license of the English-speaking nations in permitting women
to intrude on male occupations. There is no doubt but that women (and it
may be said a large majority of men) are now through evolution unsuited to
occupations involving spasmodic expenditure of force, and well suited to
those implying continuity. As Bachhofen, Reclus, and Otis T. Mason have
shown, two-thirds of the occupations of this last type have been created
by women. Man, as Havelock Ellis demonstrates, in accordance with the law
of evolutionary advance, is adjusting himself to these occupations.
Attempts to regulate employment of women in unhealthy trades are a step in
the right direction so far as prevention of a factor of degeneracy is
concerned, since it can be carried out without that disregard of personal
liberty which is more dangerous in such attempts at regulation than the
defect to be regulated.
The periods of menstruation and pregnancy in degenerate women require
(from what has been said on maternal impressions) special attention suited
to the individual, and not prescribed indiscriminately for all classes. An
excellent illustration of the dangers of Procrustean prescription is the
instance where the vegetarianism of the mother during pregnancy was
followed by the production of ill-nourished offspring. Diet during
pregnancy undoubtedly can exercise a great influence for good, but this
diet must ignore the "longings" of pregnant women, which are simply the
bulimia, or abnormal appetite for food, produced by irritation of the
medulla.
In dealing with the toxic factors the question of legal regulation of the
opium and alcohol habits requires attention. There is very little doubt
but that the routine prescription of alcohol and opium (in the shape of
paregoric and soothing syrup) by the laity for painful menses, teething,
toothache, &c., underlies many cases of degeneracy in the offspring. This
prescription is the more dangerous because it is recommended in the hidden
guise of nostrums by hysterics with blatant alcoholophobia. One of the
most energetic female advocates of the legal prohibition of alcohol
beverages endorsed very emphatically the nostrum of one of her hysteric
supporters which contained 50 per cent. alcohol and 1 per cent. each of
cocaine and morphine. As the persons largely under the influence of such
endorsement were hysterics whose zeal for reform was largely an expression
for desire for notoriety, the dangers of its use during menstruation
cannot well be over-estimated. To reach this serious source of degeneracy
from alcohol and the narcotics, statement on each bottle of the exact
composition of nostrums should be exacted by law.
Government could exercise a potent influence for good on alcohol abuse by
improvement of sanitary conditions in the tenement or apartment house
districts. Experience in New York and elsewhere has shown that improvement
in tenement houses produces decided decrease in the number of dram shops
in tenement-house neighbourhoods. The earlier tenement-houses in New York,
as elsewhere, were originally dwellings intended for one family. As these
were replaced by houses specially built for tenements, with proper
sanitary arrangements and improved ventilation, not only did a tremendous
decrease occur in the infantile death-rate, but a decrease also in the
patronage of dram shops. In many instances it was apparent that alcoholic
abuse had grown out of poverty. Foul air and crowded quarters had begotten
not only a desire for stimulants but a desire for social intercourse. The
dram shop met social needs as a club. It is along this line that
Government can make best use of its police powers.
The Government, in exercise of its police powers directed to sanitary
ends, could enable the trade unions to secure improved sanitation in shops
in which occupations unhealthy by themselves or because of environment,
are carried on. In this way improved sanitation of unhealthy occupations
could be best secured.
The prophylaxis of degeneracy in the mother and father may be summed up as
simply the prevention of a state of neurasthenia, or nervous exhaustion,
whether this condition (involving the functions of growth, motion and
sensation, which, as Marinesco has shown, exist in every neuron and its
processes) exhibit itself in the general nervous system or in the organs
connected with alimentation, elaboration, and excretion. Every factor of
acquired degeneracy produces what is practically this condition of
neurasthenia ere exerting any influence in the production of degeneracy.
In other words, the neurasthenia of the ancestor becomes the neurosis of
the descendant. Therefore the neurasthenia requires in its treatment in
the ancestor the removal of the exciting cause and the treatment of the
effect by physiologic rest in the truest sense of the word. In a general
way, therefore, the ordinary principles of hygiene applied to each
individual case will suffice to prevent development of this neurasthenia.
The part of Government in this is very small. It is true here that, as
remarked by Johnson--
"How small of all that human hearts endure,
That part which kings or laws can cure!"
Training of the individual rather than governmental regulation must be the
factor to prevent degeneracy in the ancestor. Indeed governmental
regulation by injuring self-reliance (that factor so easily destroyed and
so hardly regained) may itself be a potent factor in degeneracy.
Prophylaxis of degeneracy in the individual should commence with the birth
of the child. Whatever may be said of hypothetical ante-natal training,
there is no doubt that considerable benefit can be accomplished during the
first months of life. As the great aim of training is to secure
self-control, it must be obvious that to accustom an infant to expect
attention at every moment it cries, whether the cry be the expression of
need or not, is to weaken, not to strengthen, its self-control.
Furthermore, regularity in bodily functions is a great source of strength.
The child can be trained during the first months of life by careful
attention to its wants on the one hand, and as careful inattention to its
caprice on the other, so that all its functions become equably regular and
automatic. With this regularity many of the factors underlying caprice,
peevishness, and anger can be prevented in the earliest months of life.
Unless there be enormous deficiency in the associating fibres a good start
can then be made toward the creation of a secondary ego. It is at this
period and during that of the first dentition that training is too often
neglected or perverted in such a way as to strengthen the primary ego at
the expense of the secondary. At this period the extent of training needed
may be judged by the amount of stigmata, few though they be, present in
the child. With the period of the first dentition certain mental and
nervous stigmata manifest themselves. If the child be liable to
convulsions on the slightest causes, if it manifest screaming fits without
apparent reason, if it be frequently assailed by night terrors, serious
attention is needed, and this attention should be directed not only to its
mental and nervous condition, but also to its functions of assimilation,
elaboration, and excretion. Here dangerous degeneracy may show itself
which is not apparent elsewhere. The training of the child should be
conducted along the lines recommended during the first months of life. The
essential principles governing this have been excellently outlined by
Jules Morel.[264] The treatment of all degenerates, and consequently their
preservation from the evils that threaten them, ought to begin in their
earliest infancy. First avoid exaggerating hereditary predisposition when
serious neurosis has occurred in the parental line. Too often such a
conclusion is adopted, and hope of recovery in the descendants is
abandoned because one of the parents or the grandparents was affected with
insanity by reason of organic disease of the brain. Preliminary
examination of the neurotic needs to be made before one is enabled to
judge as to the effects of heredity. Only after a careful examination can
the extent of heredity be determined. The proof will be beyond doubt when
in parents and in their children stigmata of anatomic and physical
degeneration are abundantly found.
In dealing with the question of the education of the child, the signs of
fatigue expressed in the ears and face should receive attention. Attempts
are being made in the schools of Chicago and elsewhere to determine these.
The following schedule prepared by Colin A. Scott for the Chicago Public
Schools is an excellent means towards this end:--
_Eye_:--Each eye should be examined separately and in a good light.
Hold a card over one eye while the other is being examined. In using
the optometer, find the place where vision of the dots is the easiest
and most distinct. In using Snellen's test card, place the pupil at
the distance marked upon the card. Have him begin at the top and read
down as far as he can, first with one eye and then with the other. He
should be able to read a majority of the test type. Test with
optometer, and in reporting use the number on the stem preceded by F
for far-sightedness, and N for near-sightedness.
Place the card for astigmatism at the distance marked upon it. Cover
one eye and ask pupil to indicate, without moving nearer, the circles
which appear blacker or lighter than the others. Bring the card nearer
and find at how many feet distant he still sees any of the circles
darker or lighter than the others. At a sufficient distance every one
betrays some degree of astigmatism, which is of consequence as a
defect only when capable of detection within the distance indicated
upon the card. Outside of this point astigmatism may be reckoned as
absent and marked 0 in the report. Note if the pupil suffers
habitually from inflamed eyelids, and inquire if he complains of tired
and painful eyes or headaches after reading, studying, or using his
eyes in other similar ways. Note any other defect of formation or
position of either eye. Test the movement of the eyes by moving a coin
to about eighteen inches of the eyes.
Test each ear with the same watch in the same place and position.
Establish the normal degree of hearing for your room under these
conditions. Describe each ear in the report as--(1) normal; (2)
slightly hard of hearing; (3) hard of hearing; (4) considerably deaf;
or (5) deaf. As a further test, place the pupil at a distance and ask
him to repeat a number of words or letters. In all of these tests care
must be taken to avoid the possibility of suggestion in asking
questions or by other means. Note if the child is a mouth-breather, or
gives other signs of adenoids or enlarged tonsils. Notice circulation
in each ear.
_Signs of Fatigue, &c._:--In no case should it be said in the presence
of a young child that he is nervous or defective in development or
nutrition.
Note the position and balance of the body in standing and sitting, and
whether the movements are--(1) habitually restless and fidgety; (2)
note especially the balance of the head; and (3) position and
occupation of the hands, showing nervousness or not; (4) note any
twitching or marked lack of motor control in any part of the body; (5)
note whether the pupil flushes periodically or frequently; is the
pupil (6) easily excited or (7) fatigued by task in school or at home?
Inquire if the pupil has frequent "morning tire" (number of days per
month) or headaches not connected with serious defects of the eyes.
(8) Is he unduly irritable or irascible? Are there any other signs of
lack of emotional control--for example, (9) being too easily
impressed; or (10) with an undue tendency to tears, or uncontrollable
laughter?
Note the general condition of bodily nutrition (this by no means
depends directly upon food), and the number of signs of failure in
physical development (height, weight, &c.)
Researches along this line in Germany and England have shown that the
fatigue produced by studies varies, and that it is possible by arranging
sequence of studies to remove fatigue produced by one study through the
rest furnished by another. It has been found that biology exhausts least
and mathematics and grammar most. While there is undoubtedly a spirit of
emulation stirred by these last two studies which is injurious, the
limited associations affected by them are further a source of fatigue as
well. The numerous associations of biology afford points of rest on the
one hand while not tending to emulation on the other. It is this spirit of
emulation, with its attendant alternation of worry and hope, that causes
so many of the acquired nervous disorders of the adult, and which hence is
obviously much more potent for evil in the child.
Physical and mental training in the special asylums for imbeciles and
idiots gives such splendid results that it is surprising that parents, and
especially those charged with bad heredity, are not encouraged and advised
by their physicians and friends to try from the first year of the child's
life special measures for their preservation. If a persevering physical
and psychic management of the weak-minded gives such admirable results in
asylums, it would be still better if the child could be trained from the
earliest period of its life. This subject is ignored by the public, and in
every case not sufficiently appreciated. First of all try to preserve
patients of a nervous or of a weak constitution. They should know in what
state of health they are living, they must be informed of the great danger
of matrimonial union with a person of the same tendencies, and especially
when consanguinity exists between them. The greatest care is to be given
to children of this class. Experience has already led to the conclusion
that mental and physical overwork increases this defect: hence young
brains must not be over-excited with worry or emotionalism. The will of
children ought to be cultivated and strengthened. Their minds should be
methodically educated. The bodily functions should never be artificially
stimulated in any way, to increase unduly the assimilation of the food.
Development of the intelligence, the sensibility and the physical
training, should be looked after in the same way. Once a plan of living is
laid down it should be followed. Success depends on this. The great
influence of hygienic conditions (air, light, food, dress, habitation,
sleep, muscular exercise, &c.) should not be forgotten, for without them
efforts made for mental training are useless. By putting these methods
into execution an increase of the congenital taint is prevented, and such
methods perceptibly amend the psychopathic depreciation which in the usual
way of living would certainly become worse. The object very often thus
secured is double; aggravation has been prevented, amelioration has been
obtained.
In dealing with nervous exhaustion produced by the infectious diseases,
the dangers of the convalescent period are not sufficiently taken into
account. Parents are but too apt from mistaken motives of economy to
dismiss the physician at the onset of convalescence. It is precisely at
this period that the system hovers between permanent systemic defect and
recovery. Proper diet and proper training at this time will often prevent
the checking of puberty development, and hence a breakdown under the
stress of that period. The same is true of the convalescent period from
such diseases in adults. Many a mother has thus injured her constitution
and given birth to degenerate children in marked contrast with the
normality of the children born before.
Frequently efforts are unsuccessful either because the family physician
and the educator have no time to superintend treatment, or because they
are unable, for many reasons, to individualise treatment properly. Hence
the high value of well-organised special boarding schools for the
degenerate.
The special aim, says Koch, is to teach the patient to govern himself, to
repose confidence in himself. To reach this end a great deal is required
of him who undertakes the treatment. He has to exercise himself with
patience. He must know how to divide the time for work and the time for
rest. For many of these ill-balanced subjects variety is wanted as well in
physical work as mental training.
Those charged with these remedies, exercising good judgment, are soon able
to distinguish the more favourable cases from the more difficult. They can
soon say that a favourable remedy for the one may be noxious for another,
and _vice versâ_. Tonics, spirits, cold baths, &c., and even hypnotism may
be tried, but great caution is to be exercised, and these remedies should
never be employed except by prescription of physicians.
Even subjects of congenital mental instability suffering from obsession
(imperative ideas) without delusions are not inaccessible to treatment. In
these cases naturally the most important part belongs to the medical
treatment as in most mental cases. The more serious cases, dating from the
first youth and aggravated in proportion to the age, are not to be
completely cured. The progressive evolution can be stopped and patients
ameliorated in such a way that improvement makes their life bearable.
The same results can be obtained with less degenerate subjects. Success
occurs often when patients are enabled to understand the nature of their
sufferings, to discern that their disease does not belong to insanity,
that it is unlikely to lead to mental disease. This understanding is one
of the best of all anodynes. Donders, of Utrecht, said to one of his
patients suffering from optic hyperæsthesia of neurasthenic origin: "What
medicine cannot do, time and oftentime hygiene realise." The intelligent
patient having thus received assurance of his sight, good hygiene and
mental rest soon after produced a cure. Acquired mental depreciation may
exist from the first years of the child's life. These depreciations in
proportion to their intensity are characterised by fatigue and even
nervous exhaustion accompanied with physical weakness and functional
trouble in one or more organs of sense, by pathological debility of the
intelligence and impaired memory especially for recent facts, difficulty
of comprehension and of associating ideas and judgment, as well as
worries, fears, despairs, especially in cases of intoxications by
morphine, cocaine, bromides, coffee, &c. These are increased by
irritability and excitability when the troubles arise from onanism,
puberty, or other periods of transformation in the sexual life.
Fight from the first the symptoms of predisposing and occasional causes,
because if aggravation be prevented recovery is possible. Especially in
these depreciations must the physician utilise all his knowledge and prove
that only mental science is sufficient to cure such patients. Not only has
he to guide the intellectual life, and life of sensibility and will, but
he has also to remedy the morbid physical conditions, to superintend the
general régime, times of work and rest, air, light, dressing, preservation
from alcoholic and other excesses.
One great element of possible danger of the first importance is training
in the sexual sphere. To avoid and at the same time to enlighten is the
problem presented. In dealing with this problem the great requirement,
balance, not repression, must be kept in mind. Masturbation is very
frequently an expression not of mental or moral deficiency, but of purely
local (first in at least most cases) physical conditions. Irritation (from
the presence of worms in the rectum or vagina, an intensely acid state of
the urine, or constipation) to male foreskin and female clitoris has
produced a local itching, the attempt to relieve which has led to
masturbation. Granting all that has been said about the deteriorating
effects, especially in degenerates, the source should first be sought
here. Attention to these physical states will often prevent the
development of this practice and its resultant moral deterioration.
In dealing with the sexual appetite the fact should be remembered that
encouragement of healthy modesty is a duty in both sexes, and
pre-eminently so in the male. Too much of what is called "sexual purity"
is very often an expression of sexual perversity. While great stress has
been laid on the evil effects of association between boys, too little
stress has been laid on the danger of the training of boys by women. The
sexual history of boys often demonstrates that their initiation into the
sexual life was first at the instance of women older than themselves,
often servants, but not rarely sexual "purists" or persons whose
ostentatious religiosity covered a sexual perversity. In the healthy
association of the sexes there is very little danger, but in such morbid
association there is great danger, the more that the morbid conceals
itself under religiosity and the allied phases of sexual perversion. Great
stress has been laid on the dangers of co-education, but the growing
opinion is that education limited to one sex is the source of even greater
dangers to both boy and girl. It is a matter of common observation among
genito-urinary specialists, alienists and gynecologists, that much of the
alleged "purity" so ostentatiously displayed by graduates of colleges
limited to one sex, is often the offspring of a sexual perversion which,
whether congenital or not, has been fostered by the environment of one sex
without the modifying, healthy influence of the other.
In dealing with these cases the stigmata first likely to attract the
physician's attention are in the milder cases those of the jaws, teeth,
nose, throat, ear, and eye. Rapid decay of the teeth often leads to the
discovery not merely of constitutional degeneracy, but also of the effects
of certain strains which aggravated this. Dentists, mouth, throat, ear,
and to a lesser degree eye specialists, are hence in a position to detect
degeneracy at its outset. If they do not put the cart before the horse,
and refer the constitutional symptoms to the local disturbances, they are
in a position to be of eminent service to the race.
What Jules Morel has said of the more evident degenerates is equally true
of the others. Education should be conducted along the lines which Froebel
indicated when he pointed out that play is the child's work, and that a
development of this work is the natural problem for education. Extension
of the general training of the whole body, from the properly conducted
kindergarten to the school, is the principle on which all education should
be conducted. This is recognised by advanced educators, as previously it
had been recognised by the physician confronted with the effects of school
strain resulting from the opposite theory. Manual training is a principle
long adopted by idiot schools, where training of certain muscles through
both mental and physical methods precedes intellectual training alone.
Manual training may, however, be the source of equal dangers with the
excessive abuse of intellectual training which preceded it. In the
education of the degenerate, as in the education of the other members of
the race, the true source of success is to avoid "the falsehood of
extremes."
INDEX OF AUTHORS
Agassiz, 43
Aitken, Sir W., 86
Alexander, Harriet C. B., 57, 151, 285, 320, 335
Amabile, 61, 109
Amadei, 20
Annandale, 263
Andronico, 319
Anstie, 83
Aquinas, St. Thomas, 6
Aristotle, 5, 6, 10, 11, 66
Attmyer, 12
Aubry, 77
Augustine, St., 6
Awl, 144
Ayres, Howard, 201
Bacon, Francis, 3
Bacon, Roger, 6
Bachhofen, 349
Baer, Von, 13, 70, 172
Bannister, H. M., 87
Bastian, 297
Bauer, S., 47
Beach, Fletcher, 25
Bemiss, S. M., 81, 86
Benedikt, 22
Berwig, Elise, 60
Billod, 143
Bischoff, 298
Bjornstrom, 20
Bock, 204
Boëthius, 4
Bourgeois, 86
Bremer, L., 117
Brigham, 8, 18, 21, 144
Broca, 18
Brown-Sequard, 48
Bruce, 204
Buchanan, 214
Buffon, 5, 67
Bullard, 115, 116
Bulwer, 122
Bureau, 109
Burnett, 45
Burton, 3
Byron, Lord, 78
Calkins, 109
Campagne, 18, 176
Camper, 12, 181, 183, 185, 187
Carpenter, G. T., 245
Carson, 61
Catlin, 173
Charrin, 65, 71, 72, 122
Chiarrurgi, 8
Christopher, W. S., 145, 150, 156
Clapham, Crochley, 176
Clark, C. K., 142
Clouston, 25, 336
Cohen, M. A., 47, 48
Cohn, 287
Conger, 88, 89
Coolidge, F. S., 71, 122, 268
Cope, E. D., 52, 179
Cowles, 21
Cullen, 287
Cunningham, 31
Dally, 12
Dana, C. L., 24, 197, 337
Dareste, 67, 70, 203, 268, 301
Darier, 90
Davis, Barnard, 174
Davis, Chas., 81
Darwin, Chas., 9, 131, 212, 213, 214
Darwin, Erasmus, 7, 12
Darwin, G. H., 82, 83
Defoe, 92
Demarquay, 200
Dent, 286
Des Champs, 332, 334
Despine, 18
Dewees, W. P., 125
Dickens, Chas., 289
Dixon, 102
Dohrn, 5, 15, 32
Donders, 359
Down, Langdon, 25, 82, 91, 105, 199, 331
Double, Le, 64
Doutrebente, 75
Dryden, 10
Duncan, J. M., 91
Du Puy, 50, 51, 52, 71
Dumas, Alexander, 322
Dyer, Thistleton, 2
Earle, F. B., 61, 109
Eimer, 49
Ellis, Havelock, 34, 103, 133, 349
Erlenmeyer, 61, 109
Esquirol, 9, 24
Etienne, 115
Ewald, 159
Eykman, 137
Farnham, Eliza, 2
Féré, 45, 56, 66, 69, 159, 200, 289
Felken, 138, 139
Fernelius, 3
Fisher, 21
Fletcher, 142
Folsom, 21, 154, 203
Fothergill, 31, 287
Foville, 20, 175, 362
Fowler, G. B., 157
Frigerio, 217, 218
Galen, 5
Galt, 18, 21
Galton, 54, 207
Geddes, 40
Gibney, V. P., 55
Gihon, 135
Giovanni, De, 73, 126
Gley, 65, 71, 72, 122
Godding, W. W., 21, 22
Goethe, 6
Gomme, 95
Gordon, B. O., 47, 48
Gray, J. P., 22, 24, 62
Grenzer, 199
Griesinger, 24
Grille, 20
Grimaldi, 320
Grohmann, 12, 17
Hæckel, 282
Hamilton, A. McL., 24
Hammond, W. A., 328
Hannover, 203
Harris, Elisha, 18
Harvey, William, 1
Hawthorne, N., 218
Heschl, 314
Heuse, 64
Heusinger, 10
Hilaire, G. St., 6
Hippocrates, 6, 138
His, 303
Hogden, 119
Howard, H., 24
Howe, Delia E., 194
Hoyt, C. S., 20
Hubbard, F. H., 20, 61, 109
Hughes, C. H., 21, 61, 109
Huss, 105
Huss, Magnus, 107
Hutchinson, 200, 238, 240
Huth, A. H., 82, 83
Ireland, 25, 201
Irving, Washington, 43
Itard, 25
Jacobi, 9, 25
James, Alex., 73
Johnson, 105
Johnston, Sir H. H., 101, 117, 118
Julien, 281
Kant, 162
Kasparek, 64
Keane, 93, 94, 95, 96, 99
Kerlin, 20, 21, 24, 25
Key, Axel, 20
Kiernan, J. G., 1, 8, 10, 22, 24, 30, 53, 59, 62, 63, 71, 73, 87, 88,
90, 94, 95, 96, 97, 105, 106, 109, 119, 139, 144, 152, 166, 201, 206,
265, 267, 278, 285, 296, 297, 300, 320, 325, 333
Kingsley, 181
Knecht, 199
Kowalevsky, 14, 19
Krafft-Ebing, 20, 66, 105, 323, 324
Koch, 368
Lagorio, A., 59
Lamarck, 7
Landolt, 204
Lankester, Ray, 14, 31
Laing, 96
Lauvergne, 12
Le Double, 64
Lélut, 12
Levenstein, 61
Lind, Jas., 138
Lockwood, 48
Lombroso, 13, 21, 60, 320, 331
Lucas, Prosper, 12, 200
Luys, 78
Macaulay, 5
Macdonald, Jas., 21
Magalhaes, 330
Magnan, 20
Manning, 87
Marestang, 137
Marie, 278
Marro, 89
Marsh, 200
Marshall, 17
Mason, O. P., 349
Maudsley, 17, 24, 25, 66
Maupas, 41, 44, 80
Maupertius, 263
Mattison, 61, 109
McFarland, A., 21
McBride, J. H., 21
Meige, 274
Menatta, 102, 103
Mendel, 117
Mercier, 66
Merrick, 319
Merrill, 64
Meynert, 15, 20, 66, 298, 299, 312
Mickle, 176
Mills, C. K., 25, 304, 305
Milne-Edwards, 333
Minot, 35, 161, 178
Mitchell, A., 82, 91
Mitchell, Weir, 159
Monteyel, De, 87, 285
Moor, 71
Moquia-Tandea, 43
Moreau (de Tours), 10, 12, 16, 66, 72
Morel, A. B., 9, 10, 13, 24, 27, 63, 66, 67, 142, 213
Morel, Jules, 253, 362
Morton, 173
Moyer, H. N., 268
Muhr, 303
Mummery, 247
Munson, 141
Murray, 200
Murrell, 61, 109
Myer, Ludwig, 214
Nichols, C. H., 21
Nicolson, 20, 25
Niepce, 7
Nothnagel, 338
Obersteiner, 50
Obici, 175
Ogle, 200
Osborn, 5, 202
Osler, 25, 286, 289
Paddock, C. E., 73, 129
Parkman, 8, 12, 153
Patterson, 21, 144
Petrie, Flinders, 96
Petersen, F., 173
Phisalix, C., 204
Pinckard, C. P., 206
Pinel, 8
Planches, Tanquerel des, 119
Plato, 11
Potain, 286
Prichard, 8, 18
Proctor, 53
Pruner-Bey, 132
Raleigh, Sir Walter, 111
Ray, I., 8, 24, 81
Réclus, 349
Remondino, P. C., 47
Rennert, 62, 119
Ribot, 45
Ricochon, 73
Rilliet, 80
Ringer, 109
Roller, 87
Rolph, 106
Roof, 106
Rosser, C. V., 246
Royce, 18
Rush, Benjamin, 7, 18, 21, 66, 109
Sachs, B., 165
Sampson, 12
Sander, 16, 298, 299
Saulle, Legrande du, 59
Schüle, 20
Scott, Sir Walter, 95
Scott, Colin A., 156, 254
Semper, 202
Shakespeare, 1
Shuttleworth, 25
Siebold, 43
Souques, 287
Spencer, 28, 70
Spitzka, 20, 21, 24, 42, 43, 45, 59, 66, 67, 91, 105, 176, 294, 296,
297, 300, 302, 305, 325, 338
Stearns, H. M., 24
Stedman, 8
Stokvis, 136, 137, 138
Strahan, 76, 77, 83, 86
Saurez, 6
Sue, Eugene, 12
Suetonius, 6
Sully, 150
Sutton, Bland, 27, 28
Sylvius, 5
Tamassia, 20
Tamburini, 20
Tarnowsky, Pauline, 199, 319, 320
Taylor, 94, 96
Tennyson, Lord, 62
Tessier, 9
Thiebault, 86, 87
Thomson, Bruce, 8, 25
Tissot, 8
Tonnini, 20
Topinard, 96
Trélat, 200
Tuke, D. H., 80
Tyler, 174
Tyndall, 25, 318
Valenta, 285
Valude, 204
Verga, 20
Vecchio, Dei, 175
Vesalius, 5
Viault, 139
Vidocq, 12
Virchow, 50
Voisin, 12
Vogt, 17, 95, 132, 133
Warner, Francis, 155
Weigenberg, 42
Weismann, 46, 47, 51, 52, 125, 130, 131, 346
Westphal, 1, 20, 49, 50
Wharton, 268
Wilbur, 21
Wiley, 14
Wilson, D., 100
Wilson, G., 19
Wilson, 13
Wilmarth, A. W., 305
Wolf, William, 47
Wood, Jas., 115
Workman, J., 25, 88
Ziegler, 296
Zola, 77
INDEX OF SUBJECTS
Achondroplasia, 267
Acrocephaly, 171
Acromegaly, 37, 278, 279, 280
Alcohol, 350
Alcohol and Degeneracy, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108
Ambidexterity, 55
Animals and Defectives, 1
Anthropology, Morel on Morbid, 13
Anthropoid Apes, 34
Appendix Vermiformis, 30, 290, 291, 292, 293
Arch of Jaw, Deformed, 249, 250, 251, 252
Arch of Jaw, Normal, 248, 249
Arrest of Development, 30
Artero-capillary fibrosis, 288
Atavism, 40, 307, 311, 347
"Bleeders," 286, 287
Blue Babies, 284
Bowel Disorders from School Strain, 157, 158
Brachycephaly, 170, 171, 172
Brain, Criminal, 22, 295, 304
" Degeneracy of, 294, 295
" Degeneracy, Types of, 295, 296, 297, 298
" Imbecile, 297, 304, 305
" Weight of, and Intellect, 166, 300
Breasts, Degeneracy of, 274
Cancer, Degenerate nature of, 28
" Fecundity in, 74, 75, 76, 77
Castration, 3, 4, 348
Cell and Heredity, 40, 41, 42, 43, 51
Chæmacephaly, 171
Chest, Deformities of, 261, 262
" Degenerate, 261, 271
Child and Degeneracy, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156
" and nutrition, 141, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149
Fatigue in, 353, 354, 355, 356, 357
Neurotic, 335, 336, 337
Chondrocranium, 163, 164
Circumcision, 47, 48
Cleft-Palate, 197, 198, 200
Climate and Degeneracy, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138,
139, 140
Cloaca, 283
Club-foot, 267, 268
Club-hand, 267, 268
Coca and Degeneracy, 117, 118
Coccyx, 259, 260
Coffee and Degeneracy, 116
Collateral Heredity, 46
Concrescence Theory, 221, 222, 223
Conjugation and Nutrition, 42
Contagion and Degeneracy, 121, 122, 123, 124
Convalescence, Hygiene of, 350, 351
Cranium, Degenerate, 165
" Embryology of, 161, 162
Crime, 318, 319
Criminal, 17, 18, 19, 24, 25
" Brain, 22, 295, 304
" Stigmata, 18
Criminology, 17, 18, 19, 24, 25
Cryptorchidism, 274, 283
Cuvier, Brain of, 166
Cyclopic Eye, 33, 202, 203, 204, 205
Darwin's Tubercle, 212, 213, 214, 215
Deaf-mutism, 283
Degeneracy, 2, 15, 19
" Alcoholic, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108
" Childhood and, 151, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156
" Child Nutrition and, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149
" Climate and, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140
" Coca, 117, 118
" Coffee, 116
" Contagion and, 121, 123, 124
" Disease and, 28
" Ethical, 37
" Folklore of, 1
" Fungi and, 143, 144
" Infection, 121, 123, 124
" Intellectual, 37
" Isolation, 144
" Local, 38
" Maize, 143
" Mental, 315, 316, 317, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326,
327, 328, 329, 330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 335, 336, 337, 338,
339, 340, 341, 342, 343, 344, 345
" Metallic Poisoning, 119, 120
" Moral, 315, 316, 317, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322, 323, 324, 325, 326,
327, 328, 329, 330, 331, 332, 333, 334, 335, 336, 337, 338,
339, 340, 341, 342, 343, 344, 345
" Neurasthenia, 39
" Nutritive, 38
" Opium, 109, 110
" Parental Age and, 89
" Potato, 144
" Prophylaxis of, 351, 352, 353
" Race Intermixture and, 92, 93, 97, 99
" Reversional, 38
" Savages and, 1, 2
" School Strain and, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156, 157
" Sensory, 37
" Soil and, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139, 140,
141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149
" Spinal, 38
" Stigmata of, 37
" Syphilis and, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128
" Tea, 115, 116
" Tobacco, 111, 112, 113, 114, 115
" Toxic Agents and, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108, 109, 110, 111, 112, 113,
114, 115, 116, 117, 118, 119, 120
" Tuberculosis and, 124, 125, 126, 127, 128
Development, Arrested, 68, 69, 70
" Excessive, 68, 69, 70
Diabetes, Fecundity in, 73, 74
Dipsomania, 337, 338
Direct Heredity, 45
Dolichocephaly, 169, 170
Durencephaly, 315
Dwarfism, 277, 278
Ear, Evolution of, 207
" Jug-handled, 213, 214
" Morel, 213, 214
" Satanic, 218
Ectrodactylia, 263
Ectromelia, 262
Embryology, Morbid, 71, 72, 73
" Vertebrate, 70
Environment, 350, 351
Epilepsy, 6, 313, 338, 339, 343
Epistaxis in Degenerates, 194
Evolution and Disease, 28
" in Fertilisation, 41
Eye Degeneracy, 201, 202, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207
" Evolution of, 201, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207
Face and Brain, 34, 35, 36, 37
" Degenerate, 177, 181, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 188
" Embryology of, 35, 36, 37, 38, 181, 182, 183
" Evolution of, 35, 36, 37, 38, 181, 182, 183
" Ideal, 181
" in Man, 34, 35, 36, 37
" in the Vertebrates, 34, 35, 36, 37
Facial Angle, 181, 182
Fatigue at Puberty, 154, 155
Fecundity and Mortality, 30
Feminism, 273, 274, 275, 276
Fertilisation, Evolution in, 41
Fetichism and Defectives, 1
Fingers, Degenerate, 263, 264, 265, 266
Folklore of Degeneracy, 1
Foot, Flat, 280, 281
" Prehensile, 281
Fungi and Degeneracy, 143, 144
Genius, 11
" and the Child Type, 35
Giantism, 277, 278
Goitre, 141
Golden Age Myth, 2
Gout, 289
Hare-lip, 200, 201
Hæmophilia, 286
Heredity, 2, 3, 19, 40
" of Acquired Characters, 48
" and Ambidexterity, 55
Heredity and Atavism, 70
" of Circumcision, 47, 48
" and Face Deformity, 55
" and Germ Plasm, 46, 346
" and Hairy Deformity, 53
" and Healthy Atavism, 63, 64, 65
" and Hernia, 268, 269
" Indirect, 45
" Morbid Manifestations of, 69
" Motor Disturbance and, 56
" Mutilation and, 48, 49, 50
" and Onychophagia, 55
" Reversional, 52, 53, 54
" Sexes in, 44, 45, 46, 47
" Skin Deformity and, 53
" Transformation of, 75, 76
" Types of, 45, 46
Hermaphrodism, 41, 42, 60
Heterophagy, 42
Hutchinson's Teeth, 238, 240
Hydrocephaly, 166
Idiot, 17, 25
" Biology of, 17, 25
" Brain of, 17, 25
" Epileptic Change in, 25
Ichthyosis, 288
Individuation, 28, 29
Inebriety, 337, 338
Infantilism, 272, 276, 278
Infection and Degeneracy, 121, 122, 123, 124
Intermarriage, 81
" Consanguinous, 83
" Neurotic, 87
Instinct, 317
Intermaxillary Bones, 5
Iris, 206
Isophagy, 42
Isolation and Degeneracy, 144
Jaws--
" Blind, 257
" Criminal, 258
" Deaf-mutes, 257
" Degenerate, 239, 246, 247, 248, 249, 250, 253, 255, 256
" Evolution, 232
" Idiot, 257
" Inebriate, 257
" Insane, 257
" Prostitutes, 257
" Stigmata of, 253, 254, 255
Kephalones, 167
Kleptomania, 338
Klinocephaly, 170
Kidney Disorders from School Strain, 158
Law of Economy of Growth, 67
Leontiasis, 278, 279
Leptocephaly, 170
Limbs, Degenerate, 262, 263, 264, 265, 266
Lipomatosis, 289
Macrocephaly, 166
Macrodactylia, 266
Macrophthalmia, 206
Maize and Degeneracy, 143
Marriage, Regulation of, 81, 83, 87, 347, 348
Masculinism, 273, 274, 275, 276
Maternal Diet and the Foetus, 60
" Emotional Stress and Foetal Defect, 59, 60, 61
" Impressions in Bird, 57, 58
" Impressions in Man, 56, 59, 60, 61, 62
" Lead Poisoning and the Foetus, 62
" Opium Habit and the Foetus, 61, 62
" Sensory Disturbance and the Foetus, 56
" Stigmatisation and the Foetus, 57
Merycism, 293
Mesocephaly, 169
Metallic Poisoning and Degeneracy, 119, 120
Microcephaly, 167, 168
Microdactylia, 266
Microphthalmia, 206
Monstrosity artificially Produced, 67, 68
Moral Insanity, 4, 25
Mouth-breathing, 248
Muscle Degeneracy, 268
Myxoedema, 288
Nanocephaly, 168
Nervous Heredity, 16
Nervous Prostration, 351, 352, 357
Neurotics, 333, 334
Nose Degeneracy, 189, 190, 191, 192, 193
" Degeneracy and Tuberculosis, 193
" Development of, 193, 194
" Erectile Tissue of, 194
" in Bleeders, 194, 195
Night Terrors, 152
Nutrition and Conjugation, 41, 42
Nymphomania, 338
Obesity--
" Fecundity in, 72, 73
" Juvenile, 159, 289
Occiput Degeneracy, 175
Onychophagia, 55
Opium and Degeneracy, 109
Opium Habit, 350
Organs as Parasites, 30
Pachycephaly, 171
Paranoia, 325
Paranucleus, Hermaphrodism of, 41
Parasitism, 30
Palate Degeneracy, 196, 197, 198, 199, 200
Parental Age and Degeneracy, 89
Parthenogenesis, 44
Patella Degeneracy, 268
Paupers, 19
Periods of Stress in Man, 33
Perversion, Sexual, 319, 320, 321
Pessimist, 331
Phocomelia, 262
Phthisis, Degeneracy Stigmata of, 78
" Fecundity in, 71, 72, 73
" Nervous States of, 71, 72, 73, 74, 75
Physical Effects of School Strain, 152, 153
Pineal Body, 202
Plagiocephaly, 172
Platycephaly, 171
Plural Births, 285, 286
Polydactylia, 263, 264, 265, 266
Polydactylism, 263, 264, 265, 266
Polymastia, 284
Porencephaly, 314
Potato and Degeneracy, 144
Predisposition, Unilateral, 64
Prostitution, 318, 319, 320, 321, 322
Puberty, Anomalies of, 154
" in Anthropoid Apes, 34, 35
" in Europeans, 35, 36
" and Maturity Development, 36, 37
" in Negro, 35
" Promise and Maturity Fulfilment, 35, 36, 37
Pyromania, 338
Race Intermixture, 93
Reasoning Maniacs, 327
Reproduction Cell, 28
" Destroyed Tissue and, 40
" Unicellular, 42
" Unisexual, 29
" Virgin, 44
Rheumatism and Gout, Fecundity in, 72, 73
Ribs, Degenerate, 260
Sacrum, 259, 260
Satyriasis, 333, 338
Scaphocephaly, 174
School Strain and Degeneracy, 152, 153, 154, 155, 156, 157, 354, 355,
356, 357
School Strain and Puberty Anomalies, 154
School Overstrain, 354, 355, 356, 357
Sea Squirt, 14
Sexdigitism, 263
Sexual Appetite, Training of, 361
" "Purity," 361
" Perversion, 319, 320, 321
Skin, Senile, 287, 288, 289
Skull, Flattened, 171
Soil and Degeneracy, 130, 131, 132, 133, 134, 135, 136, 137, 138, 139,
140, 141, 142, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 148, 149
Spenocephaly, 169
Spina-bifida, 258, 259
Spine, Development of 258, 259, 260
Sterility, Race Intermixture and, 98
Stigmata, 1, 27
Stigmata, Union of, 263
Stomach Disorders from School Strain, 158
Studies, Alternation of, 358
Sub-microcephaly and Intellect, 167
Suture Closing and Brain Defect, 162, 163, 164, 165
Symelia, 262
Syndactylia, 263
Syphilis and Degeneracy, 128
Tail in Degenerates, 260
Tapeisocephaly, 172
Teeth--
" Atavistic, 232, 233, 234, 240, 241, 242, 244, 246, 247
" Degenerate, 219, 226, 231, 234, 235, 240, 241, 242, 243, 244, 245,
246, 247, 248
" Evolution of, 220, 221
" Supernumerary, 230, 232, 233
" and Hair Deformity 53, 54
Tobacco and Degeneracy, 111, 112, 113
Tramps, 331
Trigonocephaly, 173
Trochocephaly, 172
Tuberculosis and Degeneracy, 124, 125, 126, 127
Tumours, 285, 286
Unhealthy Trades, 349, 350, 351, 352, 353
Unilateral Predisposition, 63, 64
Uvula Degeneracy, 198
Women--
" Neurotic, 332
" Occupations of, 349, 350, 351
" Status in Evolution, 274
UNWIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] _Alienist and Neurologist_, 1895.
[2] _Folklore of Shakespeare._
[3] _Anatomy of Melancholy_, sixth edition, 1652, part i., sec. ii., mem.
i., sub. sec. vi.
[4] _From the Greeks to Darwin_, p. 25.
[5] _Works_, Sydenham Society Edition.
[6] _Histoire Naturelle_, edition 1761.
[7] _Zoonomia_, "Generation," vol. i.
[8] _Diseases of the Mind_, p. 46.
[9] _Traité des Dégénérescences Physiques, Intellectuelles et Morales de
l'Espèce Humaine_, 1857, p. 3.
[10] _Traité de Pathologie Comparée._
[11] _La Psychologie Morbide dans ses Rapports avec la Philosophie de
l'Histoire._
[12] _Alienist and Neurologist_, January 1892.
[13] _Traité Physiologique et Philosophique de l'Hérédité Naturelle_,
1847.
[14] _Les Forçats._
[15] _The Mysteries of Paris._
[16] _Les Vrais Mystères de Paris._
[17] _Annales Judiciares_, 1840.
[18] _American Journal of Insanity_, April, 1846.
[19] _Criminal Jurisprudence and Cerebral Development_, 1841.
[20] _De la Formation de Type dans les Variétés Dégénérés_, 1864.
[21] _Chapters on Evolution_, p. 349.
[22] Wiley, _Origin of the Vertebrates_.
[23] _Degeneration._
[24] _Die Ursprung der Wirbelthier_, 1875.
[25] _Psychiatrie_, 1859.
[26] _Psychologie Morbide_, 1889.
[27] _Archiv f. Psychiatrie_, 1868.
[28] Cited by Griesinger, edition 1845, p. 252.
[29] _Recherches sur les Idiots_, 1860.
[30] Cited by Havelock Ellis, _The Criminal_, p. 29.
[31] _Gulstonian Lectures_, 1870.
[32] See, for instance, Art. "Microcephaly," _Dict. of Psych. Medicine_,
and, especially, Mingazzini's study of the morphology of cerebral
hemispheres, _Il Cervello_, 1895.
[33] _Psychologie Naturelle._
[34] _Journal of Mental Science_, 1870.
[35] _American Prison Association Report_, 1866.
[36] _Deterioration and Race Education_, 1876.
[37] _Report of the New York Board of Charities_, 1876.
[38] _W. S. Tuke Prize Essay on the Somatic Ætiology of Insanity_, 1877.
[39] _Allgemeine Zeitschrift f. Psychiatrie_, 1869-78.
[40] _Journal of Mental Science_, 1873.
[41] _L'Uomo Delinquente_, 1876.
[42] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease_, January, 1878.
[43] _Studien au Verbrecker-Gehirnen._
[44] _Chicago Medical Review_, July 1, 1881, p. 310.
[45] _Two Hard Cases_, 1882.
[46] _Trial of Charles J. Guiteau_, vol. ii.
[47] Every Asylum Report of the Gray School gave statistics of hereditary
transmission.
[48] _Medical Jurisprudence._
[49] _Mental Disease._
[50] _American Journal of Neurology and Psychiatry_, vol. ii.
[51] _Alienist and Neurologist_, 1882.
[52] _Canada Medical and Surgical Journal_, Feb., 1882.
[53] _Medical Times_, May 20, 1882.
[54] _Transactions of Pennsylvania Medical Society_, 1882.
[55] _Selection dans les Aristocracies._
[56] _Journal of Mental Science_, 1879.
[57] _Canada Medical and Surgical Journal_, Feb., 1882.
[58] _Journal of Mental Science_, April, 1878.
[59] _Evolution and Disease._
[60] _Medicine_, 1897.
[61] _Brain_, 1894.
[62] Ray Lankester, _Degeneration_.
[63] _Man and Woman_, pp. 23, 390.
[64] _Human Embryology_, p. 567.
[65] E. S. Talbot, _Etiology of the Osseous Deformities of the Head, Face,
Jaws, and Teeth_.
[66] _Evolution of Sex_, p. 129.
[67] _St. Louis Clinical Record_, 1878-81.
[68] _Germ Plasm_, pp. 431, 565.
[69] _American Medico-Surgical Bulletin_, August 15, 1893.
[70] _Circumcision_, p. 204.
[71] _Medicine_, July, 1898.
[72] _Medical Record_, vol. xlii.
[73] _Organic Evolution_, p. 178.
[74] _Comptes rendus_, 1882, xciv., p. 697.
[75] _Transactions of the American Neurological Association_, 1877.
[76] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease_, 1877, p. 544.
[77] _Factors of Organic Evolution._
[78] _Hereditary Traits._
[79] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease_, 1877, page 548.
[80] _Sensation et Mouvement_, chap. xiv.
[81] Harriet C. B. Alexander, _Transactions Chicago Academy of Medicine_,
January, 1895.
[82] _Medical Classics_, July and August, 1888.
[83] _Chicago Medical Journal and Examiner_, 1883-4, p. 426.
[84] _Somatic Ætiology of Insanity_, p. 41.
[85] _Medicine_, September, 1898.
[86] _Review of Insanity and Nervous Disease_, March, 1891.
[87] _American Journal of Obstetrics_, October, 1882.
[88] _American Medico-Surgical Bulletin_, July 15, 1896.
[89] _American Journal of the Medical Sciences_, October, 1856.
[90] _La Famille Névropathique_, 2nd ed., 1898.
[91] _Transactions American Neurological Association_, 1877.
[92] _Transactions de l'Institut Pasteur_, 1896.
[93] _La Psychologie Morbide._
[94] _On the Mind_, 1805.
[95] _Pathology of the Mind._
[96] _Lehrbuch der Psychiatrie._
[97] _La Famille Névropathique._
[98] _Dégénérescence de l'Espèce Humaine._
[99] _St. Louis Clinical Record_, 1878-81.
[100] _Neurological Review_, vol. i., 1886.
[101] _La Famille Névropathique._
[102] _Medicine_, June, 1898.
[103] _Bulletin Medical_, 1887.
[104] _Medicine_, September, 1897.
[105] _Annales Medico-Psychologique_, March and April, 1869.
[106] _Marriage and Disease_, pp. 186-7.
[107] _Annalles Medico-Psychologiques_, S. 7, t. xvi.
[108] _Maladies Mentales_, p. 215.
[109]
"The darkness of her Oriental eye
Accorded with her Moorish origin
(Her blood was not all Spanish, by the by;
In Spain, you know, this is a sort of sin).
When proud Grenada fell, and, forced to fly,
Boabdil wept; of Donna Julia's kin
Some went to Africa, some stayed in Spain,
Her great-great-grandmamma chose to remain.
"She married (I forget the pedigree)
With an Hidalgo who transmitted down
His blood less noble than such blood should be;
At such alliances his sires would frown,
In that point so precise in each degree
That they bred in and in, as might be shown,
Marrying their cousins--nay, their aunts and nieces,
Which always spoils the breed, if it increases.
"This heathenish cross restored the breed again,
Ruined its blood, but much improved its flesh;
For, from a root, the ugliest in Old Spain,
Sprung up a branch as beautiful as fresh,
The sons no more were short, the daughters plain."
[110] The origins of the prohibition of incest have lately been fully
discussed by Durkheim, _L'Année Sociologique_, 1898.
[111] _Psychological Dictionary_, "Consanguinity."
[112] _Bulletin de L'Académie de Médecine_, t. xxi. p. 746.
[113] _American Medical Bi-Weekly_, vol. xii., No. 13.
[114] _Mental Hygiene_, p. 25.
[115] _Intermarriage of Relations_, p. 40.
[116] _Edinburgh Medical Journal_, October, 1865.
[117] _Marriage of Near Kin_, p. 218.
[118] _American Journal of Insanity_, 1869-70.
[119] _Marriage and Disease_, p. 266.
[120] Cited by Ribot, _Heredity_, p. 292.
[121] Cited by Huth.
[122] _Allgemeine Zeitschrifft für Psychiatrie_, B. xxvii.
[123] _L'Encephale_, October, 1882.
[124] _Detroit Lancet_, September, 1882.
[125] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease_, 1883.
[126] _Australian Medical Gazette_, 1886.
[127] _Il Manicomio_, May, 1886.
[128] _Alienist and Neurologist_, January, 1887.
[129] _La Pubertà_, 1898, pp. 242-60.
[130] _Archives d'Ophthalmologie_, 1887.
[131] _Transactions International Medical Congress_, 1887, p. 264, vol. v.
[132] _Lancet_, January to March, 1883.
[133]
"For Englishmen to boast of generation
Cancels their knowledge, and lampoons the nation.
A true-born Englishman's a contradiction,
In speech an irony, in fact a fiction.
And here begins the ancient pedigree
That so exalts our poor nobility.
'Tis that from some French trooper they derive,
Who with the Norman bastard did arrive.
The trophies of the families appear.
Some show the sword, the bow, and some the spear,
Which their great ancestor, forsooth, did wear.
These in the herald's register remain
Their noble mean extraction to explain;
Yet who the hero was no man can tell,
Whether a drummer or a colonel;
The silent record blushes to reveal
Their undescended, dark original.
These are the heroes that despise the Dutch
And rail at new-come foreigners so much,
Forgetting that themselves are all derived
From the most scoundrel race that ever lived;
A horrid crowd of rambling thieves and drones,
Who ransacked kingdoms and dispeopled towns;
The Pict and painted Briton, treacherous Scot,
By hunger, theft, and rapine hither brought,
Norwegian pirates, buccaneering Danes,
Whose red-haired offspring everywhere remains,
Who, joined with Norman-French, compound the breed
From whence your true-born Englishmen proceed.
And, lest by length of time, it be pretended
The climate may this modern breed have mended,
Wise Providence, to keep us where we are,
Mixes us daily with exceeding care.
We have been Europe's sink, the jakes where she
Voids all her offal outcast progeny.
For ages, fugitives from neighbouring lands
Have here a certain sanctuary found;
The eternal refuge of the vagabond,
Wherein but half a common age of time,
Borrowing new blood and manners from the clime,
Proudly they learn all mankind to contemn,
And all their race are true-born Englishmen."
[134] _Ethnology_, p. 201.
[135] _Alienist and Neurologist_, 1892, 1895, 1896.
[136] _Origin of the Aryans._
[137] _Ethnology in Folklore._
[138] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease_, 1886.
[139] _Origin of the Aryans._
[140] _Alienist and Neurologist_, January, 1892.
[141] Cited by S. Laing, _Human Origins_, pp. 38-41.
[142] _Anthropology._
[143] _Alienist and Neurologist_, October, 1896.
[144] _Origin of the Aryans._
[145] Talbot, _Osseous Deformities_.
[146] _Osseous Deformities of the Jaw_, p. 30.
[147] _Hybridity and Heredity_, p. 307.
[148] Cited by Keane, _Ethnology_, p. 265. See also Johnston, _British
Central Africa_, 1897.
[149] _Journal Am. Medical Ass._, vol. xx., 1893.
[150] _La Razza Negra_, p. 20, 1864.
[151] _Man and Woman_, pp. 25, 390.
[152] Johnson, _Chemistry of Common Life_, vol. i. p. 239.
[153] _Detroit Lancet_, September, 1882.
[154] _Observations on the Brain and Mind_, p. 10, 1798.
[155] _The Opium Habit._
[156] _Review of Insanity and Nervous Disease_, 1890.
[157] _Annual Universal Medical Sciences_, 1895.
[158] _Annual of the Universal Medical Sciences_, 1892; and (for Summary
of Etienne's Report on the offspring of the young married women in the
Nancy factories), _British Medical Journal_, April 23, 1898.
[159] _Annual of the Universal Medical Sciences_, 1889.
[160] _Annual of the Universal Medical Sciences_, 1895.
[161] _Lancet_, November 30, 1891.
[162] _Neurologisches Centralblatt_, 1887.
[163] _Chemistry of Common Life_, vol. ii.
[164] _Lead Diseases_, American edition, 1848.
[165] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases_, 1881.
[166] _American Journal of Obstetrics_, October, 1882.
[167] _Birmingham Medical Review_, January, 1887.
[168] C. E. Paddock, of Chicago, cites very analogous cases.
[169] _Variation of Plants and Animals under Domestication_, vol. i. p.
37.
[170] Keane, _Ethnology_, p. 203.
[171] _Lectures on Man_, 1868.
[172] _Man and Woman_, chap. iv.
[173] _Annual of the Universal Medical Sciences_, 1892, K. 18, vol. v.
[174] _Annual of the Universal Medical Sciences_, 1892.
[175] Boies, _Pauper and Prisoner_.
[176] _New York Medical Journal_, vol. lxii.
[177] _American Journal of Insanity_, 1887.
[178] _La Pellagra._
[179] _Journal of the American Medical Association_, vol. xxii.
[180] _Psychology of Childhood._
[181] _Journal American Medical Association_, vol. xxii.
[182] _Alienist and Neurologist_, 1897.
[183] _Illustrations of Insanity_, 1817.
[184] _Pepper's System of Medicine_, vol. i.
[185] _Journal of Mental Science_, 1886-87.
[186] _Nervous Diseases of Children._
[187] _Diseases of the Stomach._
[188] _Embryology_, p. 465.
[189] Virchow, _Gesam. Abhandlg., Wis. Med._, 1856.
[190] _Report New York City Asylum for the Insane_, 1875.
[191] Kiernan, _Alienist and Neurologist_, January, 1891.
[192] _Annales Medico-Psychologiques_, 1849.
[193] _Anthropology._
[194] _American Journal of Insanity_, July, 1895.
[195] _Revista Sperimentale_, xxii.
[196] _Human Embryology_, p. 468.
[197] _American Naturalist_, 1883.
[198] _Oral Deformities_, p. 480.
[199] _Medicine_, September, 1897.
[200] For cases see, _e.g._, Gould's _Anomalies_.
[201] Bland Sutton, _Evolution and Disease_, p. 193.
[202] _Osseous Deformities_, p. 398.
[203] _Journal of Morphology_, vol. v.
[204] _Arb. Zoolog. Institut_, Wurzburg, iii.
[205] _The Amphioxus._
[206] _Sajous' Annual_, 1889.
[207] _Sajous' Annual_, vol. iv., 1892.
[208] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Diseases_, 1878.
[209] _La Famille Névropathique_, p. 156.
[210] _Medicine_, May, 1898.
[211] For further particulars, see "The Degenerate Ear," by Eugene S.
Talbot, _Journal of The American Medical Association_, January 11, 1896.
[212] Minot, _Embryology_.
[213] Minot's _Embryology_.
[214] _The Descent of Man_, p. 15.
[215] Frigerio's measurements of the auriculo-temporal angle were taken
with a specially devised instrument from the pinna to the mastoid.
Buchanan's were apparently taken from the anterior edge of the mastoid to
the helix, giving the angle of the external face of the whole ear.
[216] See "Degenerate Jaws and Death," by Talbot, _Journal Am. Medical
Association_, vol. xxvii. p. 134.
[217] Osborn.
[218] Talbot, "Mouth breathing not the cause of contracted jaws and high
vaults" (_Dental Cosmos_, 1891).
[219] Per cent.
[220] Féré, _La Famille Névropathique_, p. 158.
[221] Ibid., _Nouv. Icon. de la Salpêtrière_, 1890.
[222] _Jour. de l'Anat. et de la Phys._, 1893, p. 564.
[223] Cited by Gould in _Anomalies_.
[224] Gould, _op. cit._
[225] Gould, _Anomalies_, p. 272.
[226] _Revue Internat. des Sciences Med._, November 1886.
[227] Achondroplasia, or imperfect development of cartilage with resulting
imperfections in the extremities, has come under my observation. The first
case, a man of 38, had a face arrested in development and the appearance
of a ten-year-old boy. His jaws were small with a protrusion of the lower.
His arms were absent. The hands were full sized and attached to the
shoulder. Another case was that of a member of the Spanish nobility in
whom degeneracy was stamped on the entire body. He was short in body and
had an enormous head. The jaws were undeveloped with a V-shaped arch. His
left hand was located near the shoulder.
[228] _Alienist and Neurologist_, January, 1898.
[229] _Medicine_, January, 1898.
[230] Wharton, _Proc. Royal Society of Ireland_, 1863.
[231] _British Medical Journal_, January 25, 1897.
[232] Meige, _L'Anthropologie_, T. 6, Nos. 3, 4, 5.
[233] Havelock Ellis, _Psychology of Sex_, vol. i. "Sexual Inversion."
[234] Otis T. Mason, _Smithsonian Contribution to Knowledge_, 1888.
[235] Julien, _Monatschrift für Prakt. Dermatologie_, March, 1898.
[236] _Annual of the Universal Medical Sciences_, 1892.
[237] _L'Encephale_, 1883.
[238] _Neurological Review_, 1886.
[239] _Malthusianism and Crime._
[240] _Wiener Med. Wochenschrift_, February 13, 1897.
[241] _British Medical Journal_, April 23, 1898.
[242] "Stigmata of Degeneracy in Royal Families," _Jour. Am. Med. Assoc._,
vol. xxvii. 1894.
[243] _Practice of Medicine._
[244] _Progrès Medical_, July 15, 1888.
[245] _Somatic Etiology of Insanity_, 1877.
[246] Ziegler, _Pathologic Anatomy_.
[247] Vogt, _Lectures on Man_. The lettering refer to the text of that
work.
[248] _St. Louis Clinical Record_, vol. viii. p. 66.
[249] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease_, 1886, p. 54.
[250] _Journal of Nervous and Mental Disease_, 1886.
[251] In the foregoing, and to some extent in the following, chapters it
has been necessary to touch on many complicated questions of brain
function, more or less outside the main topic of this book. The aspect of
such questions is, however, constantly changing in the light of new
investigations, and our knowledge is still far from certain in many most
important respects. For excellent statements of the prevailing views of
brain localisation, brought up to date, the reader may be referred to the
special sections of the latest editions of Foster's _Physiology_, or of
Waller's _Physiology_; Donaldson's _Growth of the Brain_ may also be
consulted.
[252] _Work among the Fallen_, summarised in _Journal of Mental Science_,
1892.
[253] _Études Anthropométriques sur les Prostituées._
[254] _Archivio di Psichiatria_, 1882.
[255] And see the biography of Marie Duplessis by Georges Soreau in _Revue
de France_, 1898.
[256] _St. Louis Clinical Record_, 1879-80.
[257] _The Man of Genius._
[258] _Journal of Mental Science_, 1886.
[259] _Review of Insanity and Nervous Diseases_, 1891.
[260] _Alienist and Neurologist_, July, 1893.
[261] _American Journal of Insanity_, 1893-4.
[262] _New England Medical Monthly_, 1881.
[263] _Germ Plasm._
[264] _American Journal of Insanity_, 1893-4.
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Transcriber's Notes:
Passages in italics are indicated by _italics_.
Punctuation has been corrected without note.
The following misprints have been corrected:
"hemipheres" corrected to "hemispheres" (page 36)
"Louisana" corrected to "Louisiana" (page 99)
"somtimes" corrected to "sometimes" (page 112)
"manifestions" corrected to "manifestations" (page 148)
"two" corrected to "too" (page 212)
"centrals" corrected to "central" (page 234)
"from" corrected to "form" (page 258)
"looses" corrected to "loses" (page 260)
"mathemacian" corrected to "mathematician" (page 297)
"cortes" corrected to "cortex" (page 313)
"Nevropathique" corrected to Névropathique (footnote 209)
Other than the corrections listed above, inconsistencies in spelling and
hyphenation have been retained from the original.
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