The difficulty about accepting such traits as this is that they are almost impossible of exact definition. The long teaching experience of Mrs. Evelyn Fletcher-Copp (Journal of Heredity, VII, 297-305, July, 1916) suggests that any child of ordinary ability can and will compose music if properly taught, but of course in different degree.

Seashore, C. E., in Psychol. Monogs, XIII, No. 1, pp. 21-60, Dec., 1910. See also Fletcher-Copp, ubi sup. Mrs. Copp declares that the gift of "positive pitch" or "absolute pitch," i. e., the ability to name any sound that is heard, "may be acquired, speaking very conservatively, by 80% of normal children," if they begin at an early age. It may be that this discrepancy with Seashore's careful laboratory tests is due to the fact that the pupils and teachers trained by Mrs. Copp are a selected lot, to start with.

The contributions on this subject are very widely scattered through periodical literature. The most important is Karl Pearson's memoir (1914), reviewed in the Journal of Heredity, VI, pp. 332-336, July, 1915. See also Gini, Corrado, "The Superiority of the Eldest," Journal of Heredity, VI, 37-39, Jan., 1915.

Journal of Heredity, VIII, pp. 299-302, July, 1917.

Biometrika, IV, pp. 233-286, London, 1905.