“Right about that,” said the doctor to himself as he turned away, a friend of Mrs. Whitford’s having come up at the moment and interrupted the conversation—­” right about that; and you, I greatly fear, will be one of the number.”

“Our friend isn’t just herself to-night,” remarked Mr. Elliott as he and Dr. Hillhouse moved across the room.  “A little dyspeptic, maybe, and so inclined to look on the dark side of things.  She has little cause, I should think, to be anxious for her own son or husband.  I never saw Mr. Whitford the worse for wine; and as for Ellis, his earnest purpose in life, as you so well said just now, will hold him above the reach of temptation.”

“On the contrary, she has cause for great anxiety,” returned Dr. Hillhouse.

“You surprise me.  What reason have you for saying this?”

“A professional one—­a reason grounded in pathology.”

“Ah?” and Mr. Elliott looked gravely curious.

“The young man inherits, I fear, a depraved appetite.”

“Oh no.  I happen to be too well acquainted with his father to accept that view of the case.”

“His father is well enough,” replied Dr. Hillhouse, “but as much could not be said of either of his grandfathers while living.  Both drank freely, and one of them died a confirmed drunkard.”

“If the depraved appetite has not shown itself in the children, it will hardly trouble the grandchildren,” said Mr. Elliott.  “Your fear is groundless, doctor.  If Ellis were my son, I should feel no particular anxiety about him.”

“If he were your son,” replied Dr. Hillhouse, “I am not so sure about your feeling no concern.  Our personal interest in a thing is apt to give it a new importance.  But you are mistaken as to the breaking of hereditary influences in the second generation.  Often hereditary peculiarities will show themselves in the third and fourth generation.  It is no uncommon thing to see the grandmother’s red hair reappear in her granddaughter, though her own child’s hair was as black as a raven’s wing.  A crooked toe, a wart, a malformation, an epileptic tendency, a swart or fair complexion, may disappear in all the children of a family, and show itself again in the grand-or great-grandchildren.  Mental and moral conditions reappear in like manner.  In medical literature we have many curious illustrations of this law of hereditary transmission and its strange freaks and anomalies.”

“They are among the curiosities of your literature,” said Mr. Elliott, speaking as though not inclined to give much weight to the doctor’s views—­“the exceptional and abnormal things that come under professional notice.”

“The law of hereditary transmission,” replied Dr. Hillhouse, “is as certain in its operation as the law of gravity.  You may disturb or impede or temporarily suspend the law, but the moment you remove the impediment the normal action goes on, and the result is sure.  Like produces like—­that is the law.  Always the cause is seen in the effect, and its character, quality and good or evil tendencies are sure to have a rebirth and a new life.  It is under the action of this law that the child is cursed by the parent with the evil and sensual things he has made a part of himself through long indulgence.”