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OCR Rendition - approximate
Eugenics as a Creed and the Last Decade of Calton's Life 225 would enlarge your means of work and from that point of view would be agreeable, I think and hope. It is, perhaps, well that I should copy out the paragraph in my Will, which refers to the residue after paying various. legacies, the amount of which residue will be fully what I told you and somewhat more. " I devise and bequeath all the residue of my estate and effects both real and personal unto the University of London to be held, assigned and disposed of by the Senate of that University in the furtherance of the study of National Eugenics, that is of the agencies under social control that may improve the racial qualities of future generations either physically or mentally. Provided always that it shall be lawful for the Senate by a majority of not less than two-thirds of all its members at any time after ten years shall have elapsed from the date [1906] of this my Will to divert part or the whole of the then remaining sum to the study of such other branch or branches of Biometry, Statistics or of Sociology as they may then think more worthy of support." If you think this could be amended by a-Codicil, pray tell me. Mr Heron comes to see me tomorrow till, I believe, Monday morning ; I will write the results of what I may learn from him,' etc. I hope that your reply to this may justify my telling Hartog that all the arrangements for filling up the Eugenics vacancy and its future control will be in your hands, and no longer in mine, that I wish to retire wholly and that in all matters concerning its management, except financial, he must henceforth communicate with you-May it be so ! Affectionately yours, FRANCIS GALTON. I shall think of you on the 24th*. Plymouth is a success in all essentials as warmth, cooking and comfort, but the sky and air are somewhat depressing. This letter shows that in 1906 Galton preferred qualities " to "faculties' in his definition-of' Eugenics. In the wording of both the Will of 1908 and the Codicil of May 25, 1909, the latter term replaces the former. I find from letters that passed between Galton and myself between May 4 and May 18, 1909, that he consulted me as to the drafting of this later Codicil, actually putting a copy (returned to him) before me for my suggestions, which turned solely on the desirability of granting power to the University to delay the appointment of a Galton professor, if no suitable man was at once' available. If the word " faculties " replaced " qualities " in this draft, probably Galton, and certainly I, overlooked its introduction. Historically the origin of the definition of Eugenics is of interest ; its three forms, that in the Minutes of the University as to the duties of the first Galton Research Fellow, which has been invariably used by the Galton Laboratory ; the unsanctioned change in Sir Arthur Riicker's advertisement; and finally that of the Codicil defining the bequest to the University, have already been the subject of inquiry from America. If the University were ever to insist in practice on a rigid interpretation of the phrasing of the bequest, the word "faculties might hamper a futuret occupant of the Galton Chair. It would be most undesirable that be should be precluded from studying any characteristic quality-iris pigmentation, constitution * I was probably giving a public lecture on that date, but do not remember topic or place. t Hardly in the case of the present Galton professor, as the Will permits him to associate the Biometric Laboratory with the Galton Laboratory, and biometry at least covets the "qualities" as well as the "faculties" of man ! P CF, III 29
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