been prevalent in a family may be the best safeguard against their recurrence in a future generation. The parent will be most awake to the vices or diseases in his child of which he is most sensible within himself. The whole of life may be directed to their prevention or cure. The traces of corruption may become fainter, or be wholly effaced; the inherited tendency to vice and crime may be eradicated. And so heredity, from being a curse, may become a blessing. We acknowledge that in the matter of our birth, as in our nature generally, there are previous circumstances which affect us. But on this platform of circumstances, or within this wall of necessity, we have still the power of creating a life for availment by the reforming energy of the human will."

There is much truth in these remarks of Professor Jowett, but they do not affect the argument in favor of the possibility of bringing about an improvement in the race if the proper means are adopted. It would not be any wiser for the strong and healthy to marry with the sick and weak, because the latter happen to be highly intellectual or moral, than to marry with the strong and healthy if these physical characters are united with mental weakness or immorality. There is a consensus of opinion at the present day, that what should be aimed at is the union of physical perfection with that of intellect and character, in the persuasion that steps towards this end will ultimately lead to the general improvement of the human race.

Difficulties in the Way.—The difficulty is to devise and carry out some scheme for the purpose which shall be both feasible and agreeable to public sentiment. The latter consideration would prevent any attempt at active stirpiculture under State direction, although the State might indirectly affect the result by subsidiary regulations as to marriage and training of children. There is nothing, however, to prevent the systematic efforts of private individuals, and in such cases the causes which Darwin cites as interfering with the physical action of sexual selection would not operate. The most systematic experiment in stirpiculture of modern times was that originated by John Humphrey Noyes at the Oneida Community, in central New York, from 1868 to 1879. A paper on this experiment was read by Anita Newcomb McGee before the American Science Association in August, 1891, which was published in "The American Anthropologist," 1891, and the following facts are taken from that paper.

An Experiment in Stirpiculture.—Noyes was the founder of a religious sect, the members of which, owing to their desire for freedom from sin, were called Perfectionists. Holiness was the first principle of their creed, and Noyes thought to transmit that condition from one generation to another by a process of stirpiculture. To overcome the "selfishness" of monogamic marriage he devised a "system of regulated promiscuity, beginning at earliest puberty, and by a method of his own invention he separated the amative from the propagative functions." Its first principle was that of a judicious in and in breeding, with occasional mingling of foreign blood, as in stock-raising. The second principle adopted was that of "careful selection of individuals for breeding purposes. Genealogies were studied and medical histories compiled." A committee, headed by Noyes, selected the holiest members who were free from physical defects, intellectual and other considerations being given less weight at first, although in later years they received more consideration. The parents were of all ages, but the father was always older than the mother. Some sympathy between the persons mated was always required; and if a proposition for union came from two individuals it was allowed if no objections were found. Noyes held that uncle and niece are as much related as father and daughter, because brothers have identical blood, and that cousins are in the same relation to each other as half brothers. In the Oneida Community uncles and nieces twice paired, and it is noticeable that a considerable proportion of the children had Noyes' blood on one or both sides. The founder himself had nine children in the Community, to which belonged also his brother, his two sisters and their children. As to the care of the children, this belonged exclusively to the mothers for the first nine months, after which for a further nine months they took charge of their offspring at night only. When eighteen months old, the children were transferred to a separate department which was managed by those who had shown themselves specially fitted for the work.

Let us see what was the result of Noyes' experiment. Of the sixty[39:A] children born, five died at or near childbirth from unforeseen causes depending upon the mother. All the others were alive at the date of Mrs. McGee's communication, except a boy who was reared in spite of weakness, and died from a trifling malady when about sixteen years of age. All the children were strong and healthy, the boys being tall—several over six feet—broad-shouldered and finely proportioned; the girls robust and well-built. It is remarkable, that among the children between five and nine years of age, thirteen were boys and six only were girls. With reference to their intellectual ability, it is stated by Mrs. McGee that, of the oldest sixteen boys, ten were in business, chiefly employed as clerks, foremen, etc., in the manufactories of the joint stock company. The eleventh was a musician of repute; another a medical student; one passed through college and studied law; one was a college senior, and one entered college after winning State and local scholarships, and gave great mathematical promise. The sixteenth boy was a mechanic, and the only one employed in manual labor. Of the six girls between eighteen and twenty-two years, three are said by Mrs. McGee to be especially intellectual. The mothers of these children usually belonged to the classes employed in manual labor, while the fathers, with the exception of the Noyes family and half a dozen lawyers, doctors and clergymen, were all farmers and mechanics. It is noteworthy that, as a rule, the fathers were the intellectual superiors of their mates, "and enquiry develops the fact, known in the Community, that in these cases the children are markedly superior to the maternal stock."

When this system of complex marriage had been in operation twenty years, the desire to return to the old system of monogamy arose, and it became so strong in the Community that its founder retired from it, and on August 26, 1879, complex marriage was renounced, although nominally "in deference to public sentiment." Twenty-five couples who had been married before entering the Community again became husband and wife, and twenty marriages between other individuals took place within four months after the abandonment of the stirpicultural experiment. There were then in the Community two hundred and sixteen adults and eighty-three children under twenty years of age.

So far as the real object which the founder of the Oneida Community had in view in his marriage system, it was undoubtedly a failure, as of the offspring, in spite of their early doctrinal training, only a very few are church members, and but one is a Perfectionist. This is the son of an uncle and a niece, both of Noyes' blood. From a physical and intellectual standpoint the experiment would seem to have given promise of success, but it continued too short a time to be of