SOMETHING AMISS WITH OLDEST SONS.

King Country Chronicle, Volume VI, Issue 464, 11 May 1912, Page 7

SOMETHING AMISS WITH OLDEST SONS.

Sir Francis Galton, the preatc:-.;:. living authority on heredity, has ju:;t laid down the remarkable doctrine that oldest, sons are inferior in a l ty to younger sons.

Sir Francis is himself a grandson of Dr. Erasmus Darwin and a nephew of the great Charles Darwin, and may himself be regarded a s an illustration of hereditary ability. He has always maintained that genius an 1

ability are transmitted by inheritance, in spite of many apparently contradictory ' instances in which, wc see foolish or commonplace t'.on: springing from great men.

He has analysed thousands of famines descended from great or eminent men, and shown that the proportion of ability among their descendants is much greater than in ordinary families. But he now says that this ability descends in a smaller degree to oldest sons than to younger sons. "There is not a single sentence," says Sir Francis, "so far as I have noted, in the multitude of speeches about the House of Lords that differentiates between the principles of promogeniture and heredity. The first usually implies the latter, but the converse is bs no means the case. "The claims of heredity would be best satisfied if all the sons of peers were equally eligible to the peerage, and a selection made among them, late researches having shown that the eldest born are as a ru l e inferior in natural gifts to the younger born in a small but significant digrce. Primogeniture (in which the firstborn takes all), like gavelkind (by which all sons share alike), has to be defended on other grounds besides that of heredity. "There seems to be a regrettable amount of ignorance among our legislators of the facts and statistical methods upon which eugenics (the science of race-breeding) is based."

It will be noticed that Sir Francis says that the eldest born aro inferior in "natural gifts." This, of course, means that they are born inferior and not merely that they fail to develop their natural ability, which may easily happen, because they are spoiled children over-in-dulged by fortune. Sir Francis would abolish the present basis of the House of Lords, which is. composed almost entirely of men who inherited their position because they were the oldest sons of their fathers. That is the rule of primogeniture. Sir Francis would substitute for it a body composed of men chosen by a scientific system of selection from the descendants oE men of proved ability. The selection would be modified according to tb.2 latest teachings of biological science and more members of the new body would be chosen from younger scn3 than from older sons, because that is the very latest teaching of science. A great many members of the same families as the present Lords would be chosen because they are lescended from men of unquestioned ability, but younger brothers or cousins would take the place of most of the present Lords. The idea is advanced very seriously, for Sir Francis Galton is a leading member of the National Society of Eugenics, the object of which is to improve the quality of the whole British race. The society is face to face with two fundamental facts — first, that England has produced an unusually large proportion of men of v 7 ery great ability in every line ; second, that the ability of the average Englishman is now deteriorating, both physically and mentally. The society finds that the very jreat mass of ancestral ability is not being increased, or conserved, but is being lost. Sir Francis Galton md other students of heredity believe that it could be increased if the Government and the public would observe the principles of heredity. GREAT MEN HAVE MATURE PARENTS. Dr. David Heron says :— "'The first born in a family is more likely to be insane, tuberculous or criminal than the others. It follows, therefore, that the tendency to diminish the size of families increases the average number of such individuals in the community."' Dr. Heron referred to the conclusions arrived at on this subject by Professor Karl Pcarscn. "If our observations ikc correct, and I believd them to be so.' said Dr. Pearson, "then the mental and physical condition of the first, and second' born members of a family is differentiated from that of later members. They are of more ncr-or.'. less stable constitution. V,"c find that the neurotic, the insane, the tuberculous, and the albinotic are more frequent among the elder born. Dr. Goring's results for criminality show the same law. "The result of this law is remarkable. It mcr.ir. that if you reduce the si;:e o: tin family you will tend to decrease tin relative proportion of the mentally and physically sound in the community. You will not, upset this conclusion in the least if. as I s ispect, the extraordinary able man, the genius, is also among the e irly born. For you will not ksc him if you have a larger family, although you will lo.ie the sounder members if you curtail it." Sir Francis Galton has prepared .-. table showing precisely—or as nearly precisely as matters cmbrneine; the human equation can go—the inheritances of our sons. Dr. Robinovitch, finds that great men are usually the offspring of mature parents and, censcnucntly, the younger chil.lren must more frequently be born in the ma ture period of parental life than the first born.— "Popular Science Sittings."