community--as it is for an Australian aborigine to select a conjugal partner from one social group rather than from any other.[162] It is a matter of accepting an ideal and of exerting our personal and social influence in the direction of that ideal. If we really seek to raise the level of humanity we may in this way begin to do so to-day. NOTE ON THE LIFE-HISTORY RECORD The extreme interest of a Life-History Record is obvious, even apart from its eventual scientific value. Most of us would have reason to congratulate ourselves had such records been customary when we were ourselves children. It is probable that this is becoming more generally realized, though until recently only the pioneers have here been active. "I started a Life-History Album for each of my children," writes Mr. F.H. Perrycoste in a private letter, "as soon as they were born; and by the time they arrive at man's and woman's estate they will have valuable records of their own physical, mental, and moral development, which should be of great service to them when they come to have children of their own, whilst the physical--in which are included, of course, medical--records may at any time be of great value to their own medical advisers in later life. I have reason to regret that some such Albums were not kept for my wife and myself, for they would have afforded the necessary data by which to 'size up' the abilities and conduct of our children. I know, for instance, pretty well what was my own Galtonian rank as a schoolboy, and I am constantly asking myself whether my boy will do as well, better, or worse. Now fortunately I do happen to remember roughly what stages I had reached at one or two transition periods of school-life; but if only such an Album had been kept for me, I could turn it up and check my boy against myself in each subject at each yearly stage. You will gather from this that I consider it of great importance that ample details of school-work and intellectual development should be entered in the Album. I find the space at my disposal for these entries insufficient, and consequently I summarize in the Album and insert a reference to sheets of fuller details which I keep; but it might be well, when another edition of the Album comes to be published, to agitate for the insertion of extra blank pages after the age of eight or nine, in order to allow of the transcription of full school-reports. However, the great thing is to induce people to keep an Album that will form the nucleus round which any number of fuller records can cluster." It is not necessary that the Galtonian type of Album should be rigidly preserved, and I am indebted to "Henry Hamill," the author of _The Truth We Owe to Youth_, for the following suggestions as to the way in which such a record may be carried out: