edity in incident, in external happening, may not cling to
a race? That these may not by some strange process be transmissible, as
are traits of character, temperament, stature, colouring, feature, and
face? And if this--as matter of speculation merely--was the case, must
there not exist some antecedent cause to which could be referred such
persistent effect? Might not an hereditary fate in external events take
its rise in some supreme moral or spiritual catastrophe, some violation
of law? The Greek dramatists held it was so. The writers of the Old
Testament held it was so, too.

Sitting at the low writing-table, near the blazing fire, that stark
whiteness reflected from off the snow-covered land all around him,
Richard debated this point with himself. He admitted the theory was not
scientific, according to the reasoning of modern physical science. It
approached an outlook theological rather than rationalistic, yet he
could not deny the conception, admission. The vision of a doomed family
arose before him--starting in each successive generation with brilliant
prospects and high hope, only to find speedy extinction in some more or
less brutal form of death--a race dwindling, moreover, in numbers as
the years passed, until it found representation in a single individual,
and that individual maimed, and incomplete! Heredity of accident,
heredity of disaster, finding final expression in himself--this
confronted Richard.--He had reckoned himself, heretofore, a solitary
example of ill-fortune. But, mastering the contents of these records,
he found himself far from solitary. He merely participated, though
under a novel form, in the unlucky fate of all the men of his race. And
then arose the question--to him, under existing circumstances, of vital
importance--what stood behind all that--blind chance, cynical
indifference, wanton and arbitrary cruelty, or some august,
far-reaching necessity of, as yet, unsatisfied justice?

Richard pushed the crackling, stiffly-folded parchments, the letters
frayed and yellow with age, the broken-backed, discoloured diaries and
order-books, away from him, and sat, his elbows on the table, his chin
in his hands, thinking. And the travail of his spirit was great, as it
needs must be, at times, with every human being who dares live at
first, not merely at second hand--who dares attempt a real, and not
merely a nominal assent--who dares deal with earthly existence, the
amazing problems and complexit