Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 62.djvu/269

Rh There are thirty-five persons in this list, of whom fifteen were either cruel or dissolute or both. These have the mark † against them. There are at least seven either insane or showing the neurosis in a marked degree. These have the mark * applied to them. This leaves only thirteen free. Of these, four are known to have been indolent almost to point of disease. Thus, only about nine in the thirty-five were normal. This is a remarkably small ratio of normal and is less than found in any other country.

It will be shown that selection of the worst in each generation will account for it without other causes being necessarily introduced. We get some idea here of the extent to which a degeneration can be carried, and it is worthy of note that it may be perpetuated for a great number of generations, even when breeding in. There is no evidence that the in-breeding has led to sterility, as is usually contended by historians and students of the subject. Although the male line by way of the oldest sons ceased once at Charles IL, and again at Ferdinand VII., nearly every marriage was prolific of many children, even among the closest blood relations, and one has but to glance at the 'Almanach de Gotha' for the current year to see the number of descendants that are being born to the closely inter-related families of Hapsburg, Bourbon and Orleans.

The occurrence just where they fall of every one of these modern Spanish Bourbons is compatible with the theory of mental and moral inheritance. There is no greatness springing up where we least expect it; there is no viciousness and imbecility that might not be explained from heredity alone. There is nothing that need be more than pure selection and repetition.

Of course we expect from Galton's law that, on the average, the descendants will show less of any peculiarity than the parents, and here we shall show that averaging all the descendants it is so, but all descendants would include other countries. Portugal, Austria, Italy, France, and including all these it will be shown in a later summary that there is a bettering of affairs from the time of Philip V. onward, but one must notice the artificial selection that took place in Spain. It was as if they were breeding mental monstrosities for a bench show. We see no diminution in either the debauchery or tyranny. The insanity does appear less at the bottom of the chart, but it will also be noticed that the early degenerates, Ferdinand VI. and Philip, son of Charles III., who were avowedly insane, had no children and the worst was consequently eliminated, while the worst moral depravity and laziness were not only perpetuated, but usually drawn from and in a double or triple way. This view of selection alone is important,