'
But, as far as I know, this is the only instance of this
observation on record. Herbert Spencer has shown that when a
pure-bred animal breeds with an animal of a mixed breed, the
offspring resembles much more closely the parent of pure blood,
and this may explain why the circumstance recorded by Balfour has
been so seldom noted. For a negro, who is of very pure blood,
will naturally have a stronger influence on the subsequent
progeny than an Anglo-Saxon, who comes of a mixed stock. If this
be the correct explanation, we should expect that when a white
woman married first a black man, and then a white, the children
by the white husband would be dark colored. Unfortunately for the
proof of telegony, it is very rare that a white woman does marry
a black man, and then have a white as second husband;
nevertheless, we have a fair number of recorded instances of
dark-colored children being born in the above way of white
parents.
"Dr. Harvey mentions a case in which 'a young woman, residing in
Edinburgh, and born of white (Scottish) parents, but whose
mother, some time previous to her marriage, had a natural
(mulatto) child by a negro man-servant in Edinburgh, exhibits
distinct traces of the negro.
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