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or any degenerate tendency, even though it be latent in the individuals considering marriage. When two latent hereditary traits combine in offspring, they tend to become dominant.

So the whole problem hinges on the fact that certain traits, both good or bad, are transmitted by heredity; and in consanguineous marriage, they are apt to be intensified in the offspring. If the family history^[1] may be considered unfavorable to the marriage between blood relatives, it would be better not to contract it; or if such a marriage does take place, the principals might well consider carefully the responsibility they are undertaking, and risk they are running, before having children.

In this connection, Dr. S. A. K. Strahan ("Marriage and Divorce," 1892) writes: "This accentuation of all family character is what must always happen in the case of consanguineous marriages. If there is any taint in the family, each member of the family will have inherited more or less of it from a common ancestor. Take the case of cousins, the descendants of a common grandparent who was insane, and of insane stock. Here the cousins are certain to have inherited more or less of the insane diathesis. Even if the taint has been largely diluted in their case by wise, or more likely, fortunate marriages of their blood-related parents, yet they will have inherited a certain tendency to nervous disease, and, if they marry, that taint may appear in an aggravated form in their children. Some of the children of such parents are generally idiotic, epileptic, dumb or scrofulous. It may be that the parents and possibly the grandparents of these children have not up till that time displayed