HEREDITARY CORNS. The Statement of an Extraordinary Fact Not Hitherto Known.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 130, 26 February 1887, Page 2

HEREDITARY CORNS. The Statement of an Extraordinary Fact Not Hitherto Known.

" What ie the cause of corns ?" " If; comes by nature, like a wart or any other pimple. No greater mistake was ever made than to Bay tight shoes caused cornß, but vi hen the corn ie formed the pressure of the shoe causes the pain. You can bet it never produces that nuisance of the foot, and my reason for so paying is that in my practice I have had children of three yeara brought to me for treatment. Now, it 10 not natural to suppose that a child of tender years ie foot-clad with shoes so tight as to produce corns. With them, as with older persons, nature is the originator, proving corns are hereditary, as consumption and kindred diseases are in tioma families." " You don't meau to say that corns can be handed down from sire to son ?" " I most certainly do say they can be reproduced, like a bad temper, good disposition, or any special feature of the face ; and why not ? If a son or daughter has a long or Bhort noeo like either of their parent?, why can't they have corns like their pa or ma has ? Is not this idea suggestive and reasonable ? It is an old maxim with students that like begets like, and the offspring would not be a clear image of the parents unless it resembled them in one way or another, corns included* It may be eaid that corns are cut and often eradicated. That may be true, though I doubt it, but for sake of argument we will admit the assertion. What are we to Bay about boils, scurvy and all other ills flesh is heir to ? Is it not often the case that parents subject to Buch abominations are, to all appearances, free from them, and yet their immediate descendants at one time or another suffer as they did. So it is with corns, my boy, and don't you forget it."