Part 14

The evidence for the truth of the theory of maternal impression is almost entirely due to peculiar coincidences. James I. of England, the son of Mary Queen of Scots, could never stand, according to Sir Walter Scott, the sight of a drawn sword with equanimity, and it is said even that he nearly fainted at his coronation because of an unexpected glimpse of some naked blades in the hands of courtiers. This peculiarity was attributed to the fact that his mother, while carrying him in utero, had witnessed the violent death of her secretary, the unfortunate David Rizzio. There have been, however, any {61} number of men who paled at the sight of a drawn sword before and since James I., with regard to whom no such circumstantial story could be told to account for it. There have been any number of women that have witnessed bloody murders under circumstances quite as heartrending as those surrounding Mary Queen of Scots and her secretary, and yet their offspring, though at the time in utero, have not been disturbed at the sight of drawn swords, nor of blood or any other circumstance connected with the deep impression that must have been produced on their mothers.

There is, of course, a striking instance related in the Old Testament, which seems to make it very clear that a belief in maternal impressions existed from the very earliest times among the Israelites. The story of Jacob is well known: "Jacob took him rods of green poplar and of the hazel and chestnut tree and pilled white streaks in them and made the white appear which was in the rods, and he set the rods which he had pilled before the flocks in the watering troughs when the flocks came to drink, and the flocks conceived before the rods and brought forth cattle, ring-streaked, speckled and spotted." In this case it seems evident that Jacob was not looking for a miracle, but was expecting that a law of nature would be fulfilled in the matter, the influence of the unusual sight upon the animal mothers proving sufficient to have a definite effect upon their unborn offspring. The most ardent advocates of the power of maternal impressions would scarcely concede the existence of as much influence as this of the mother's mind over the child unborn, otherwise there would surely be a very absurd collection of anomalous births in the race.

On the other hand, it is generally conceded that the mother's habitual temper of mind and the thoughts with which she occupies herself may influence her unborn offspring to a most marked degree. The story is told of a child-murderer who delighted in fiendish deeds of cruelty and had murdered many people in cold blood, that his mother, the wife of a butcher, had delighted in watching the operation of slaughtering during the course of her pregnancy. There are any number of women, however, who have, by the necessities {62} of their occupation, had to witness the shedding of animal blood under such circumstances and yet without any special effect being noticeable in their offspring. It has been said that the opposite is also true, and that if a woman occupies herself with high and lofty thoughts, with noble deeds and unselfish devotion to others and if she occupies her mind and senses with the great works of art, a correspondingly beneficial effect will be noted upon the character of the foetus. These are, however, abstruse speculations leading to conclusions not founded upon actual observation, but upon theorising over the supposed fitness of things.

Coincidence plays such a large part in the matter of supposed maternal impressions that it is impossible to decide how much there is of fact and of consequence in the many stories that are told. Most women are a little afraid, as the time of their labour approaches, lest something or other--usually of an indefinite nature--that has happened during their pregnancy, may cause the marking of their child. When they find that the child is perfectly normal, they breathe a sigh of relief and forget all about it. If any anomaly is noted, however, then they are sure to connect it with some incident during pregnancy, and imagination is apt to lend details that confirm the supposed connection. On the other hand, there are not a few cases in which such anomalies have occurred, and good, sensible mothers have been unable to recall anything that might possibly serve to account for the peculiarity noticed in the child, though corresponding peculiarities in other children were supposed to be readily traceable to maternal impression. Even where there has been no foreboding of evil results, something or other that has occurred during the pregnancy will often be magnified enough by memory to account for the supposed maternal impression.

Doctors are very familiar with this tendency to make up stories to account for various deformities. It used to be considered that hip-joint disease and Pott's disease were the result of injuries in early life. They are now known to be due to tuberculous processes not necessarily and indeed only very seldom connected with injuries of any kind. Mothers are {63} nearly always able to account in some way, however, for the beginnings of the disease in some accident that has happened. Young children are apt to have so many falls that some one of them is picked out as the probable cause of the disease that subsequently manifests itself in the joints. It is just this state of affairs that occurs with regard to supposed maternal impression. Some incident that would be otherwise unthought of is magnified into an accident that caused a serious nervous shock, and consequently led to the marking of the child.

In general it may be said for the clergyman's direction, that if women have, as is sometimes the case, a morbid sense of their guiltiness with regard to some maternal impression that has set a mark upon their child, such a state of feeling may very well be rendered less poignant by a frank statement of the present attitude of mind of most physicians with regard to the possible effects of maternal impressions. Scepticism is much more the rule than it used to be, and as time goes on fewer and fewer of the cases that used to be considered so inexplicable in the direct relationship that seemed to exist between maternal impression and deformity in the child are reported. Fifty years ago nearly all the authorities on this subject were agreed in considering that maternal impressions did play some part, though they could not explain just how, in the production of certain deformities. Now we venture to say that most of the thinking physicians who have occupied themselves with this subject would scarcely hesitate to say that they were utterly incredulous of any such effects being produced. The lack of any direct nervous or blood connection between mother and child is the basis for such disbelief, and is of itself the best argument against the old tradition.

With regard to mental defects, as a rule, not so much is said as for bodily defects. Bodily deformities are noted at once after birth, and then the mother recalls some incident of the pregnancy to account for them. Mental defects are, however, noticed much later, and are not so likely to be considered as connected with incidents of the puerperal period. There is no doubt that if the mother has had to pass through a series of emotional strains, or has suffered from severe {64} shocks, children are likely to be born with diminished mental capacity. This is, however, not difficult to understand, since such incidents produce disturbances of the nervous system of the mother, and consequently also of her nutrition, and this is prone to be reflected in the child's condition, especially in that most delicate part of the child's organism, the brain. Hence it is that children born during the siege of Paris, or shortly after, were defective to such a marked degree that they were spoken of as "children of the siege," and this was considered to be quite sufficient explanation of nervous peculiarities later in life.

Baron Larrey, the distinguished French surgeon, made a report with regard to the children born after the siege of Landau in 1793. Of 92 children, 16 died at birth, 33 died within ten months, 8 showed marked signs of mental defects, most of them to the extent of idiocy, and two were born with several broken bones. In this case, however, it is well known that besides the shock of the danger consequent to the siege and the fear and distress of the women with regard to their husbands and relatives, there were added many privations and physical sufferings. The nutrition of the mothers was seriously disturbed by these, and it might well be expected that the children should suffer severely. The statistics of such events are not available in general, and when an effort is made to establish a cause for idiocy under other circumstances, none is usually found. Out of nearly five hundred cases of idiots whose histories were carefully traced in Scotland, in only six was there any question of maternal impressions having been the cause of the condition.

Of course there are many very wonderful coincidences that seem to confirm the idea that impressions made upon the mother's mind are sometimes communicated to the child in her womb. That they are not more than coincidences, however, is rather easy to demonstrate in most cases, since, as a matter of fact, at the time when the incident occurred which is supposed to have caused the deformity in the foetus, the stage of development of the intrauterine child has passed long beyond the period when formative defects could occur. For instance, it sometimes happens that the child-bearing woman {65} sees an accident especially to the father of the child involving the loss of a limb. If, by chance the child should be born with a missing member, as sometimes happens, then there would seem almost to be no doubt of a direct connection between the accident witnessed, the effect produced upon the mother's mind, and the consequent deformity.

We know now that the formation of the limbs of the foetus is complete by the end of the third month. At this time the woman is scarcely more than conscious of the fact that she is pregnant, and it is not during this early period, as a rule, but during a much later period, that maternal impressions are supposed to have their influence. It is only such maternal impressions as occur very early in pregnancy, before the tenth week as a rule, that could possibly have any effect in the production of such deformities. It is by no means infrequent, however, to have children born lacking one or both limbs. Sometimes nothing but the stumps of limbs remain. In such cases it is now well known that intrauterine amputation has taken place. Some of the membranes that surround the child, especially the amnion, become separated into bands which surround tightly the growing members of the foetus and by shutting off the blood supply through constant pressure, lead to the dropping off of all that portion of the member lying below the band.

Not infrequently it happens that when a child is born thus deformed, the mother, by carefully searching her memory, can find some dreadful story that she has read, some accident that she has seen or heard of, and that has produced a seriously depressing effect upon her at the time, to which she now attributes the deformity that has occurred. Until the unfortunate appearance of her child was reported to her, she had no idea of any possible connection between the story and the bodily state of her intrauterine child. In not a few cases, however, the most faithful searching of the memory fails to show anything which could, by any possible connection, be made accountable for the deformity; and these cases, we may say at once, are in a majority.

Not a little of a popular notion with regard to the influence of maternal impression is due to the repetition of certain {66} village gossip which by no means loses its point or effectiveness passing from mouth to mouth. On the other hand, maternal impressions have been exploited by novelists, who have found that the morbid curiosity of women particularly with regard to this subject may make their stories more widely read. Lucas Malet, who, in spite of the apparently masculine pseudonym, is really the late Rev. Charles Kingsley's daughter, has recently called renewed attention to this subject by her novel "Sir Richard Calmady." In this the hero is born with both his lower limbs missing from just below the knees. The author has been careful, however, with regard to the details of the supposed maternal impression to which this deformity is attributed. A young married woman in the early part of her first pregnancy has her husband, whom she loves very dearly, brought back to her with both his limbs taken off by a shocking accident which resulted fatally. It is not impossible, some physicians might think, to consider that so severe a shock could produce a very deleterious effect upon the foetus. That the result should so exactly copy the scene which was brought under the eyes of the young mother is, however, beyond credence. Occasionally such stories, supposedly on medical authority, find their way into the newspapers, usually from distant parts of the country. Certain parts of Texas particularly seem to be a fruitful source of such stories for newspaper correspondents when there is a dearth of other news. Farmers in thinly settled parts of the country lose a foot in a reaping machine or a hand in the hay-cutting machine when there is no one near to help them but their wives, with the result that the shock to their wives proves the occasion of a similar deformity in an as yet unborn child. Careful investigation of such cases, however, has invariably shown that either they were completely false or that the details showed that whatever had happened was at most a coincidence and never a direct causative factor in the subsequent deformity.

The greatest difficulty in the mind of the medical man, with regard to the possibility of maternal impression being communicated in any way to the foetus, is, as we have said, his knowledge of the anatomy of mother and foetus. While it is {67} generally supposed that the mother is very intimately connected with her child in utero, the actual connection is by no means so direct as might be expected from the popular impression. It is usually considered that the mother's blood flows in the child's veins; but this is absolutely false. The child's blood is formed independently of the mother's blood quite as is that of the chick in the egg. At all times the blood of the child remains quite different in constitution to that of its mother. It contains many more red cells than does her blood and differs in other very easily recognisable ways. Mother and child are connected by means of an organ known as the placenta, which is attached very closely to the uterine wall and from which through the cord the blood of the foetus circulates. This placenta constitutes the so-called afterbirth. The mother's blood flows in one portion of it, that of the child in another, and they always remain distinct and separate from each other. The gases necessary for the child's life diffuse through the membrane which separates the two different bloods, and the salts and soluble proteids necessary for the child's nutrition, as well as the water necessary for its vital processes, all pass through this membrane, but at no time is there any direct blood connection between mother and child. Indeed, for a large part of the formative period of the foetus life, that is, during the first two months of its existence, the ovum is not very closely attached to the uterus at all, but grows by means of the vital power which it has within itself.

Nor is there any direct nervous connection between mother and child; indeed, there are no nerves at all in the placenta, and none in the cord through which all communications between mother and child must pass. It seems impossible to explain, then, how maternal impressions can so effectively pass from mother to child; and indeed, the whole subject, when looked at in this way, is apt to be considered legendary, and the facts adduced in support of the theory of maternal impressions are practically sure to be thought mere coincidences. A little knowledge here might seem to justify many things that more complete knowledge fails to be able to find any reasons for.

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There is no doubt, however, that the mother's environment during pregnancy is in general very important for the perfect development of the intrauterine child. Many more deformed births are reported after times of stress and trial, as, for example, after the sieges of great cities, notably the siege of Paris in 1871, and such scenes of desolation as occurred during the thirty years' war in Germany. These are, however, not direct, but indirect effects of maternal impressions. The development of the human being in utero is an extremely complicated process. Any disturbance of it, however slight, is sure to be followed by serious consequences. Disturbances of nutrition, such as are consequent upon the deprivation that has to be endured in times of war or during sieges, is of itself sufficient seriously to disturb even the uterine life of the child. In these cases, however, there will be no traceable connection between the form of the maternal impression and the type of deformity that occurs. This is, however, the essence of the old theory of the direct effect of maternal impressions, and consequently that theory must fall to the ground.

From all that has been said, however, it becomes very clear that as far as possible women should be shielded from the effect of various nervous shocks during their pregnancy, and that they owe it to themselves and their offspring to be careful with regard to any morbid manifestations of feeling that they may detect in themselves.

JAMES J. WALSH.

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HUMAN TERATA AND THE SACRAMENTS

Teratology ([Greek text], a monster) is a part of biology that treats of deviation from a normal development in man and the lower animals. The name was adopted in 1822 by the elder Saint-Hilaire, who then attempted to separate the results of modern exact methods of research from the myths and loose descriptions of monsters found in the writings of old authors. Cicero (De Divinatione) derives the term monster from the proper preternatural signification looked for in the occurrence of these abnormal beings: "Monstra, ostenta, portenta, prodigia appellantur, quoniam monstrant, ostendunt, portendunt et predicunt."

At the end of the seventeenth century Malpighi and Grew discovered that plant tissue is entirely made up of microscopic spaces enclosing fluid; they called these spaces cells. Different investigators found that animal tissue is also composed of cells; and between 1835 and 1839 Schwann and Schleiden formulated the law that every metazoic organism is made of cells, and starts from a cell.

In 1672 de Graaf discovered the mammalian ovum, in 1675 Ludwig Ham found spermatozoa, in 1827 von Baer recognised the human ovum, but not until 1875 was the important fact established that fertilisation is effected by the fusion of the male and female pronuclei. This was demonstrated by Oscar Hertwig from observation of the ova of starfishes.

Mammalian ova, owing to an almost complete lack of yolk, are all small. The egg of a whale is about the size of a fern-seed, but the yolked eggs of birds are large--that of the great auk was 7.5 inches long. In man the ovum is from 0.18 to 0.2 mm. in diameter, scarcely visible to the {70} naked eye, and the spermatozoon is extremely minute. The human spermatozoon is only fifty-four thousandths of a millimetre in length, and from forty-one to fifty-three thousandths of a millimetre are taken up by its flagellum. The essential part is from four to six thousandths of a millimetre in length (Dr. L. N. Boston, Journ, of Applied Microscopy, vol. iv. p. 1360). A line of 18 human spermatozoa would reach only across the head of an ordinary pin. These spermatozoa have the power of locomotion in alkaline fluid. Henle found they can travel one centimetre in three minutes.

The human ovum and spermatozoon are single cells, and the principal parts of a typical cell are the cytoplasm (called also the protoplasm), and, within this, the nucleus and centrosome. The centrosome is efficient in the process of cell-division. A few cells have also an outer envelope or membrane, and this part is well developed in the ovum.

The nucleus is the centre of activity in a cell. In the resting state it is surrounded by a membrane, and within the membrane is an intra-nuclear network made up of chromatin and linin--the chromatin is an important element. The meshes of this network are probably filled with fluid.

During the stages preparatory to the mitotic, or indirect, division of a cell into two cells (one of the methods of reproduction) the chromatin segregates in typical cases into two groups of loops, and each group has equal portions of the chromatin. When the chromatin is in this shape, a loop is called a chromosome.

The chromosomes are very important. They occur in constant definite numbers in the somatic cells of the various species of many animals and plants, and it is probable that each species of plant and animal has its own characteristic number of chromosomes. Wilson (The Cell in Development and Inheritance, New York, 1890) gives a list of 72 species in which the number has been determined. Man has probably 16 chromosomes in the somatic cell, and the mature male and female germ cells in man contribute eight chromosomes each to the nucleus of the impregnated ovum.