Depravity In The Blood

In Texas there Hved a young man who was physically handsome, and possessed of great and variad talents, which he had carefally cultivated. Moreover, he had served his -country with distinguished bravery, and was thon bolding a high position of trust and honor. But witli a regularity that was terrible, there oamo to him - 110 matter where he was, over his ledger, in the churcb, by the side ot the woman lio loved- a craving for brandy that possessod him like a denion, and drove him t'orth froui arnong his fellows. With set lips und despairing face he would del i ver to a friond tho koys of his oftico and betako hirnself to his room, - not as men go to a carousal, but as they go to meet a foarful reckoning, - and for two or throo days drink in sullon silenee UU the omving was appeased. A friend was onc day praising, in his presonce, liis vast stores of acquired intormation and his dolicato fancy as an artist. " Yot I shall die liko a brute," ho said, sadly ; and the despairing look of a hunted animal carne into his cye ns he added : " My father died drunk - my mother- God forgivo her! -my grandfather shot liimself in delirium tremens - you know, boys, how poor Patrick died - it will bo the sanie with me." His prophecy vas too soon fulfilled. ïho history of tho two Coleridges is well known. Tho father was a confirmed opium-eater ; the sou inherited with his splcndid talents, his insano craving for stimulants. With this curse haunting him, his beauty, his genius, his brilliant prospects, wore tho bitterest ironies, and a Ufe of the grandest promiso was soon sacrificed. No two vicos are niorc distinctly horeditary than thioving and gambling. Any one who has lived aiuong negroes accepta this fact without dispute. I havo known wholo families of negroes thieves. I have in einploying them, had the fact simply stated to me as a part of the transaction : " I reckon you'd better look out for your koys; sho's a likoly girl, bnt sho comes of a stealiug fatnily." Perhaps the passion for gambling becomes soonest of all universal. There are whole nations that are gamblers, who could not -with equal justico be oallcd thievos or drunkards. Not only passions and vicos, but niorbid conditions. are transmissiblo by keritage. A young, listless, fretful bride, for instance, weekly encourages hysterieal habits, or blind passionate impulses, without thinking that her hysteria may be reproduced iu some form of imbecility, or oven epilepsy. This again may becomo hereditary, or bo transmitted as niania or melancholy ; instantes of both of which are within my own knowledge. Huicide, without any mark of weak intellect, fre quently becomes hereditary, induced to often by the careful nursing of nervou and hysterical affections, and groundles