of little value to genetics, because of the inadequacy of the data they furnish. It is only in the case of exceptional families, such as the royal houses of Europe, that enough information is given about each individual to furnish an opportunity for analysis. What could be done if there were more such data available is brilliantly illustrated in the investigation by Frederick Adams Woods of Boston of the reigning houses of Europe. His writings should be read by every genealogist, as a source of inspiration as well as information.
More such data must be obtained in the future. Genealogists must begin at once to keep family records in such a way that they will be of the greatest value possible—that they will serve not only family pride, but bigger purposes. It will not take long to get together a large number of family histories, in which the idea will be to tell as much as possible, instead of as little as possible, about every individual mentioned.
The value of pedigrees of this kind is greater than most people realize.
In the first place, it must be remembered that these traits, on whose importance in the pedigree we have been insisting, are responsible not only for whatever the individual is, but for whatever society is,—whatever the race is. They are not personal matters, as C. B. Davenport and H. H. Laughlin well point out; "they come to us from out of the population of the past, and, in so far as we have children, they become disseminated throughout the population of the future. Upon such traits society is built; good or bad they determine the fate of our society. Apart from migration, there is only one way to get socially desirable traits into our social life, and that is reproduction; there is