IS HAND WRITING HEREDITARY?

The question has occasionally been asked, Does handwriting ever exhibit hereditary characteristics? Although a great deal might be said pro and con., the question may, generally speaking, be answered in the affirmative. Indeed, there is to be found in the subject of the heredity of handwriting a significance of ascertained fact m favour of the general prevalence of such a law transmitting its effects from one generation to another, which is well worthy of the consideration of physiologists. Nothing, however, can be more certain than that, in the matter of handwriting, family resemblances are as common to almost every representative as, for instance, the family nose, the family gait or habit of speech, or other peculiarity by which one particular family is distinguished from another. It may, of course, be said that a large proportion of this supposed vrainemblance in family handwriting is attributable as much to obvious faculties for imitation, thus producing a general unity of likeness, as to any predisposing natural cause subject to the operations of the law of heredity. With such faculties a son's handwriting lot it be supposed—may happen to resemble in some respect that of his father, or a daughter's that of her mother or of an aunt, or other female relative, or one brother's that of another brother, and so on, the styles or characteristics of family handwriting being variously duplicated or reproduced. Still, while that is the case in many instances, there will doubtlessly be numerous exceptions to this pretty general rule. For, as in human physiology, it is a well-accredited fact that no two faces are alike in every feature, so with chirography, no two penmen will be found precisely to resemble each other in all points, however nearly they may seem to do so. Sometimes, indeed, the difference is so great—just as in the human face or features —that it is quite impossible to detect any link of the relationship existing. Furthermore, the peculiarities of family handwriting may, like other more common hereditary symptoms and dispositions, entirely pass over a generation, and then once more reappear, bearing evidence, in not a few points of similarity, of their kin to the "original copy. This fact, however, applies more especially to families with whom the use of the quill or pen has ever been one of its strong points. It can obviously have no reference to persons whose opportunities in the practice of handwriting have been few and inconsiderable. Bnt why it should be possible for this, trait of chirography sometimes to skip one or two generations, and then again unmistakably to reassert itself, is perhaps only another andit may be reckoned —a trivial example of that erratic course which nature oftentimes pursues, baffling all human comprehension. A clue to this singular fact of transmuted chirographic likeness skipping one or more generations, and then reappearing, may, of course, be found nob so much in the moral as in the physical disposition inherited. And so the heredity of handwriting may be, perhaps, best explained according to that invariable process of Nature by which a man inherits something of the ligaments as well as the lineaments jf his progenitorsomething of the manipulative power and grasp of the lingers, as well as of the form and expression of the face. Instances of this family likeness as exhibited by means of the handwriting will probably be within the knowledge of many readers, the evidence of kinship being apparent sometimes in certain caligraphic tricks common to several members of the same family, or sometimes in the general style and character of the penmanship. This likeness is, however, to be observed with greater frequency in female than in male handwriting, probably because of the larger scope for similarity in the sharp, angular style peculiar to the former ; but there are also numerous cases of almost facsimile penmanship of different members of the same family belonging U) the other sex, even where the degree of relationship is sometimes that of of** 9111 - ship. A case in point within the knrtfledge of the writer may be quoted. Twj*°thera, whose penmanship was almost identical, quarrelled on the death of thei- father over certain properties, and separated, the younger going to a far country, while the elder remained at home. AH correspondence between them ceased for some years. One day the elder brother received a letter which, from the style and character of the penmanship of the address, he thought to bo from the younger, and, without opening it (such was the feeling of estrangement between them !) returned it to the care of a cousin, with a note to that relative that he desired to receive no communication from his brother ufltil certain legal unpleasantness were removed, and begged him, therefore, to rearward his letter. Imagine his chagrin when he learned that the epistle was no* indeed from his younger brother, but from the cousin himself, whose handwriting had so strikingly a likeness tobis»~ OsaeU's .Family Magazine.