clearer
appreciation of this situation.

Francis Galton clearly perceived the importance of this point, and
attempted in several ways to arrive at a just idea of it. One of the
most striking of his investigations is based on Dr. Duncan's statistics
from a maternity hospital. Dividing the mothers into five-year groups,
according to their age, and stating the median age of the group for the
sake of simplicity, instead of giving the limits, he arrived at the
following table:

_Age of mother at_ _Approximate average_
_her marriage_ _fertility_
17 9.00--6 x 1.5
22 7.50--5 x 1.5
27 6.00--4 x 1.5
32 4.50--3 x 1.5

which shows that the relative fertility of mothers married at the ages
of 17, 22, 27 and 32, respectively, is as 6, 5, 4, and 3 approximately.

"The increase in population by a habit of early marriages," he adds, "is
further augmented by the greater rapidity with which the generations
follow each other. By the joint effect of these two causes, a large
effect is in time produced."

Certainly the object of eugenics is not to merely increase human
numbers. Quality is more important than quantity in a birth-rate. But it
must be evident that other things being equal, a group which marries
early will, after a number of generations, supplant a group which
marries even a few years later. And there is abundant evidence to show
that some of the best elements of the old, white, American race are
being rapidly eliminated from the population of America, because of
postponement or avoidance of marriage.

Taking the men alone, we find that failure to marry may often be
ascribed to one of the following reasons:

1. The cultivation of a taste for sexual variety and a consequent
unwillingness to submit to the restraints of marriage.

2. Pessimism in regard to women from premature or unfortunate sex
experiences.

3. Infection by venereal disease.

4. Deficiency in normal sexual feeling, or perversion.

5. Deficiency of one kind or another, physical or mental, causing
difficulty in getting an acceptable mate.

The persons in groups 4 and 5 certainly and in groups 1, 2, and 3
probably to a less extent, are inferior, and their celibacy is an
advantage to the race, rather than a disadvantage, from a eugenic point
of view. Their inferiority is in part the result of bad environment. But
since innate inferio