FREDERICK CHOPIN'S ANCESTORS.--HIS FATHER NICHOLAS CHOPIN'S
BIRTH, YOUTH, ARRIVAL AND EARLY VICISSITUDES IN POLAND, AND
MARRIAGE.--BIRTH AND EARLY INFANCY OF FREDERICK CHOPIN.--HIS
PARENTS AND SISTERS.



GOETHE playfully describes himself as indebted to his father for
his frame and steady guidance of life, to his mother for his
happy disposition and love of story-telling, to his grandfather
for his devotion to the fair sex, to his grandmother for his love
of finery. Schopenhauer reduces the law of heredity to the simple
formula that man has his moral nature, his character, his
inclinations, and his heart from his father, and the quality and
tendency of his intellect from his mother. Buckle, on the other
hand, questions hereditary transmission of mental qualities
altogether. Though little disposed to doubt with the English
historian, yet we may hesitate to assent to the proposition of
the German philosopher; the adoption of a more scientific
doctrine, one that recognises a process of compensation,
neutralisation, and accentuation, would probably bring us nearer
the truth. But whatever the complicated working of the law of
heredity may be, there can be no doubt that the tracing of a
remarkable man's pedigree is always an interesting and rarely an
entirely idle occupation. Pursuing such an inquiry with regard to
Frederick Chopin, we find ourselves, however, soon at the end of
our tether. This is the more annoying, as there are circumstances
that particularly incite our curiosity. The "Journal de Rouen" of
December 1, 1849, contains an article, probably by Amedee de