M. Patissier. “The employment of tailor is one of the most sedentary: seated constantly on a board, his legs crossed, his body stooping forward, this class of labourers exercises not part of the body but the arms, and that only the right one.”
Witness. “That is not so: there is a good deal of action with the left arm in holding and sewing: in using the iron also there is a good deal of action with the arms and knees, and with the rest of the body. Journeymen tailors are remarked as being full breasted, as compared with other workmen; they carry themselves higher, and the chest is more fully developed; so that the labour has, as compared with much other labour, the effect of opening the chest.”
M. Patissier. “Their position is particularly injurious to the functions of the viscera of the abdomen and chest. It produces difficulty of digestion, injures the gastric juices, brings on constipation, hemorrhoides, chronic catarrhs of the bladder, and obstructions of the bowels.”
Witness. “I have never heard complaints beginning with the bowels. The stomach may be out of order; they eat very little solid food, and of course the action of the bowels will not be very good; but as to the effect of the tailors’ work on the chest, we do not consider it at all injurious.”
M. Patissier. “I attended a tailor who every time that he applied himself diligently to his work, was attacked with nausea, colic, jaundice, and symptoms that denoted irritation of the liver. I have known, says Stoll, a great number of tailors who have suffered more particularly from diseases of the lungs.”
Witness. “The only complaints I have ever heard are those arising from the foul air, perhaps the dust arising from cloth is injurious. I have already said that men coming from the country to a town shop will faint, and be obliged to leave it in the afternoon.”
M. Patissier. “As they are almost constantly in a sitting posture, the body bent, with the head stooping forward, the blood is unequally distributed, and too large a quantity accumulates in the lungs, either because the bowels of the abdomen, compressed by the position of the body, admit of less blood, and which is therefore forced back into the vessels situated above, or because the short respirations of those who are sedentary, prevents the blood which enters the lungs from passing out with sufficient rapidity, by which local plethora in the heart and lungs is produced. In short, tailors are very liable to pulmonary phthisis, hydro-thorax, and hæmoptysis, which often accompanies them to a very advanced age. M. Corvisart has observed that diseases of the heart and of the larger vessels are not less frequent amongst this class of artisans. As the posture of the tailor causes the blood to flow into the upper part of the body, the circulation in the lower members is consequently much less active, which explains the emaciation and feebleness of the legs and thighs of this class of artisans, and the peculiar walk which distinguishes them.”
Witness. “As to the circulation of the blood, I should say that it was more free than amongst persons sitting at a desk; as soon as the journeyman tailor begins to feel warm and swell, he loosens everything that he has on; his coat is off, and his shirt neck is open; if he wears a handkerchief it is very loose; a tailor wears no garters, nothing that can stop the circulation of the blood: the only confinement that arises is from the position, which is certainly sedentary, but he frequently changes it, and puts one leg over the other when they are tired; they also stretch their legs out. Their breathing even in the close shops is not noticed as short.”
M. Patissier. “Ramazzini says they are very subject to numbness of the thighs, neuralgic sciatica, and lameness.”
Witness. “The tailors are frequently subject to rheumatism, but that is from going from a hot to the cold open air in the way described. Men who are generally emaciated will have their legs emaciated too: the whole frame goes together, but I have never heard young men or tailors in the middle of life being remarked as deficient in that part of bodily capability. Those whom I have known to be emaciated have been spirit drinkers; the emaciation has been more from spirit-drinking than from the heat of the shop, though one brings on the other. Some years ago there used to be much racing at about five o’clock in the morning in the parks, sometimes amongst the tailors themselves, and sometimes with other runners who had celebrity. The tailors were generally good competitors and more active than other workmen in London. There was one of the country tailors at Faversham who some years ago was considered the first runner in England for a hundred yards. The tailors have certainly a peculiar walk, but all whom I have known to be lame were lame originally. When a lad has anything the matter with him, which occasions him not to be strong enough for anything working on his feet, it is a common thing to say, ‘Then we must make him a tailor.’ It is a very frequent thing to send weakly children to be tailors, though it is a bad choice, for the lad has little chance of recovering himself in the town shops, and a more open trade would be better for him. Many tailors go for sailors and soldiers, and they are always thought to be good men. I should think there are many tailors in the guards.”