the mother's own blood, it
inoculates her system with the constitutional qualities of the foetus,
and that, as these qualities are in part derived to the foetus from
the male progenitor, the peculiarities of the latter are thereby so
ingrafted on the system of the female as to be communicable by her to
any offspring she may subsequently have by other males."

In support of this view, Mr. McGillivray cites a case in which there
was presented unmistakable evidence that the organization of the
placenta admits the return of the venous blood to the mother; and Dr.
Harvey, with much force, suggests that the effect produced is
analogous to the known fact that constitutional syphilis has been
communicated to a female who never had any of the primary symptoms.
Regarding the occurrence of such phenomena, Dr. Harvey under a later
date says: "since then I have learned that many among the agricultural
body in this district are familiar to a degree that is annoying to
them with the facts then adduced in illustration of it, finding that
after breeding crosses, their cows though served with bulls of their
own breed yield crosses still or rather mongrels; that they were
already impressed with the idea of contamination of blood as the cause
of the phenomenon; that the doctrine so intuitively commended itself
to their minds as soon as stated, that they fancied they were told
nothing but what they knew before, so just is the observation that
truth proposed is much more easily perceived than without such
proposal is it discovered."[12]

Dr. Carpenter, speaking of phenomena analogous to what are here
alluded to, says:

"Some of these cases appear referable to the strong impression left by
the first male parent upon the female; but there are others which seem
to render it more likely that the blood of the female has imbibed from
that of the foetus, through the placental circulation, some of the
attributes which the latter has derived from its male parent, and that
the female may communicate these, with those proper to herself, to the
subsequent offspring of a different male parentage. This idea is borne
out by a great number of important facts. * * As this is a point of
great practical importance it may be hoped that those who have the
opportunity of bringing observation to bear upon it, will not omit to
do so."

In the absence of more general and accurate observations directed to
this point, it is impossible to say to what extent the fi