What is eugenics? / by Leonard Darwin.

  • Leonard Darwin
Date:
1932
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Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0)

Credit: What is eugenics? / by Leonard Darwin. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    СНАРТЕЕ V Eugenic Methods IT has been suggested in a previous chapter that man is a domestic animal, and that, even as regards human affairs, something can be learnt from the farmer because of his knowledge about breeding. On reading this, some may hold up their hands in dismay, and without further thought condemn any imitation of the methods of the stockyard. First of all it may be noted that some stockyard methods are certainly not to be despised. If you inspect any good establishment you will find that the animals are well housed ; that they are fed with suitable food in quantities neither too small nor too great ; and that they are carefully guarded against infection. Should not we be glad if the same could be said about our slums ? Then, again, another useful practical lesson has often been impressed on the minds of those who have had the management of large stock farms in the Dominions. Experience has made them clearly reaHze the madness of going on breeding more animals when the ranch is already fully stocked, and when the s^plus stock cannot be readily disposed of. This is a stockyard lesson which may well be remembered when considering at what point our own islands should be held to be over-populated. In another direction also we may well imitate the farmer's frame of mind. When the question before him is how to stock his farm in the future, as a matter of course he looks to breed above аП things. When taking thought as to the animals he already possesses, he concentrates his mind on their surroundings and their training. No doubt he con¬ siders how best to spend his money. But the point is that it never even occurs to him not to attend to both breed and 21