Note 13 — XIV
Reading edition
It it well to quote here the most recent comment of the late Sir Francis Galton upon this subject. It is to be found in his celebrated Huxley lecture, now published by the Eugenics Education Society, together with much of the illustrious author's other work, under the title, "Essays in Eugenics." The passage relevant to our discussion runs as follows:—
"There appears to be a considerable difference between the earliest age at which it is physiologically desirable that a woman should marry and that at which the ablest, or at least the most cultured, women usually do. Acceleration in the time of marriage, often amounting to seven years, as from twenty-eight or twenty-nine to twenty-one or twenty-two, under influences such as those mentioned above, is by no means improbable. What would be its effect on productivity? It might be expected to act in two ways:—
"(1) By shortening each generation by an amount equally proportionate to the diminution in age at which marriage occurs. Suppose the span of each generation to be shortened by one-sixth, so that six take the place of five, and that the productivity of each marriage is unaltered, it follows that one-sixth more children will be brought into the world during the same time, which is roughly equivalent to increasing the productivity of an unshortened generation by that amount.
"(2) By saving from certain barrenness the earlier part of the child-bearing period of the woman. Authorities differ so much as to the direct gain of fertility due to early marriage that it is dangerous to express an opinion. The large and thriving families that I have known were the offspring of mothers who married very young."