usin, Francis Galton, the
founder of Eugenics, is the next to the last person in the same
generation.

Many similar cases of the unusual frequency of individuals of musical
or religious ability in certain families have been published by Galton
and are well known. "As long as ability marries ability, a large
proportion of able offspring is a certainty, and ability is a more
valuable heirloom in a family than mere material wealth, which,
moreover, will follow ability sooner or later."

We might contrast with such families as have been recorded in the
three preceding figures some well-known families at the other pole of
society. As an interesting example we have the family described by
Poellmann. This was established by two daughters of a woman drunkard
who in five or six generations produced all told 834 descendants. The
histories of 709 of these are known. Of the 709, 107 were of
illegitimate birth; 64 were inmates of almshouses; 162 were
professional beggars; 164 were prostitutes and 17 procurers; 76 had
served sentences in prison aggregating 116 years; 7 were condemned for
murder. This family is still a fertile one and the cost to the State,
i. e., the taxpayers, already a million and a quarter dollars, is
still increasing.

[Illustration: FIG. 28.--History (condensed and incomplete)
of three markedly able families. (From Whetham.)]

One of the best known families of this type is the so-called "Jukes"
family of New York State so carefully investigated by Dugdale. This
family is traced from the five daughters of a lazy and irresponsible
fisherman born in 1720. In five generations this family numbered about
1,200 persons, including nearly 200 who married into it. The histories
of 540 of these are well known and about 500 more are partly known.
This family history was easier to follow than are some others because
there was very little marriage with the foreign-born--"a distinctively
American family." Of these 1,200 idle, ignorant, lewd, vicious,
pauper, diseased, imbecile, insane, and criminal specimens of
humanity, about 300 died in infancy. Of the remaining 900, 310 were
professional paupers in almshouses a total of 2,300 years (at whose
expense?); 440 were physically wrecked by their own diseased
wickedness; more than half of the women were prostitutes; 130 were
convicted criminals; 60 were habitual thieves; 7 were murderers. Not
one had even a common school education. Only 20 learned a trade, and
10 of t