There is an old and in my opinion valuable view (although it has not been “scientifically proved”) that the actual hour of conception, the condition of the parents at the moment when the germs fuse is one of vital consequences to the child-to-be. Scientific proof of this will be, of course, extraordinarily difficult to discover, but indirectly there do appear to be some actual data in favour of the converse, namely that temporary unhealthy states of the parents result in the conception of children so inferior as to be markedly and seriously anti-social. Forel (_Sexual Question_, 1908) says:-- The recent researches of Bezzola seem to prove that the old belief in the bad quality of children conceived during drunkenness is not without foundation. Relying on the Swiss census of 1900, in which there figure nine thousand idiots ... this author has proved that there are two acute annual maximum periods for the conception of idiots (calculated from nine months before birth) the periods of carnival and vintage, when the people drink most. In the wine-growing districts, the maximum conception of idiots at the time of vintage is enormous, while it is almost _nil_ at other periods. It is, of course, not always possible to arrange the hour of the union which will lead to conception. And further even when the hour of the union is arranged, nature, to some extent, controls and may modify conditions before conception. Sometimes the fertilization of the egg cell by the sperm cell takes place in the hour of the bodily union of the lovers, sometimes this inner process is delayed by hours or days (see overleaf). Conception is possible in most women at almost any time during the years of potential motherhood, yet there do appear to be several factors which lead to the potential fertility of a woman varying very much from time to time. Some women, for instance, appear to be liable to conceive only for a certain number of days in each month, and these are in general the two or three days immediately following the monthly period and the day or two immediately before. With other women, however, unions on any day of the month may lead to conception, but this depends, possibly, not only on the woman herself but on the vitality and probable length of life of the sperm cells of her husband. This also varies very greatly in individuals. The longest time which the individual sperm has been observed to remain vital after entry into the woman is seventeen days (see Bossi, _N. Arch. d’Obstetr. Gynocol._, April 1891). Hence it will be realized that a union arranged to take place under ideal and perfect conditions, perhaps on a holiday into wild and inspiring solitudes, may result as desired in the entry of the sperm into the womb of the woman, and yet the actual fusion of the sperm and egg cell, and the consequent conception may not come to pass until some days later.