Hygienic Physiology : with Special Reference to the Use of Alcoholic Drinks and Narcotics

by Joel Dorman Steele

The process of union is completed in young persons sooner than in those advanced in life; in the upper extremities sooner than in the lower; and in smaller animals more speedily than in man. In human subjects a broken arm or forearm will be healed in from six to eight weeks, while a leg or thigh will occupy nine or ten weeks.—SIR B. C. BRODIE.

FIG. 69.

[Illustration: FIG. 69. a. Monkey's Hand and Foot. b. Human Hand and Foot.]

THE HAND AND THE FOOT (p. 2l).—Man Compared with the Ape.— The peculiar prehensible power possessed by the hand of man is chiefly dependent upon the size and power of the thumb, which is more developed in him than it is in the highest apes. The thumb of the human hand can be brought into exact opposition to the extremities of all the fingers, whether singly or in combination; while in those quadrumana which most nearly approach man, the thumb is so short, and the fingers so much elongated, that their tips can scarcely be brought into opposition; and the thumb and the fingers are so weak that they can never be opposed to each other with any degree of force. Hence, though well suited to cling round bodies of a certain size, such as the small branches of trees, the anterior extremities of the quadrumana can neither seize very minute objects with such precision nor support large ones with such firmness as are essential to the dexterous performance of a variety of operations for which the hand of man is admirably adapted.

The human foot is, in proportion to the size of the whole body, larger, broader, and stronger than that of any other mammal, save the kangaroo. The surface of the astragalus (ankle bone) which articulates with the tibia, looks almost vertically upward, and hardly at all inward, when the sole is flat upon the ground; and the lateral facets are more nearly at right angles to this surface than in any ape. The plane of the foot is directed at right angles to that of the leg; and its sole is concave, so that the weight of the body falls on the summit of an arch, of which the os calcis (heel bone) and the metatarsal bones form the two points of support. This arched form of the foot, and the contact of the whole plantar surface with the ground, are particularly noticeable in man, most of the apes having the os calcis small, straight, and more or less raised from the ground, while they touch, when standing erect, with the outer side only of the foot. The function of the hallux, or great toe, moreover, is strikingly contrasted in man and the ape; for, while in the latter it is nearly as opposable as the thumb, and can be used to almost the same extent as an instrument of prehension, it chiefly serves in the former to extend the basis of support, and to advance the body in progression.—DR. W. B. CARPENTER.

FIG. 70.

[Illustration: The Leg in standing.]

The Natural Flexibility of the Toes, and How it is Destroyed.—We often admire the suppleness of the fingers by means of which we can perform such a variety of acts with swiftness and delicacy. Did it ever occur to you that the toes, which in most feet seem incapable of a free and graceful motion, even when they are not stiffened and absolutely deformed by the compression of the modern shoe, are also provided by Nature with a considerable degree of flexibility? The phalanges of the toes, though more feebly developed, have really the same movements among themselves as those of the fingers, and, in case of necessity, their powers can be strengthened and educated to a surprising degree. There are well-known instances of persons who, born without hands, or having lost them by accident, have successfully supplied the deficiency by a cultivated use of their feet. Some of these have distinguished themselves in the world of art. Who that has been so fortunate as to visit the Picture Gallery in Antwerp on some fine morning when the armless artist, M. Felu, was working at his easel, can forget the wonderful dexterity with which he wielded his brushes, mixed the oils on his palette, and shaded the colors on his canvas, all with his agile feet? The writer well remembers the ease and grace with which, at the close of a pleasant interview, this cultured man put the tip of his foot into his coat pocket, drew out a visiting card, wrote his name and address upon it, and presented it to her between his toes!

Contrast this intelligent adaptation of a delicate physical mechanism with the barbarous treatment it too commonly receives. The Chinese are at least consistent. They cripple and distort the feet of their highborn daughters until they crush out all the power and gracefulness of nature in the artificial formation of what they term a "golden lily"; but they never expect these golden-lilied women to make their withered feet useful. With us, on the contrary, every girl would like to walk well, to display in her general movements something of the "poetry of motion"; yet the absurd and arbitrary fashion of our foot gear not only makes an elastic step one of the rarest of accomplishments, but renders oftentimes the simple act of walking a painful burden. The calluses, corns, bunions, ingrowing nails, and repulsive deformities that are caused by and hidden under the narrow- toed, high-heeled instruments of torture we often wear for fashion's sake are uncomfortable suggestions that our practices are not greatly in advance of those of our Celestial sisters. Dowie, a sensible Scotch shoemaker, satirizes the shape of a fashionable boot as suited only to "the foot of a goose with the great toe in the middle." The error which may have led to the adoption of this conventional shape appears to lie in a misconception of the natural formation of the foot, and of the relation of the two feet to each other. It is true, that when the toes are covered with their soft parts, the second toe appears a little longer than the first, and this appearance, emphasized and exaggerated, is perhaps responsible for a practical assumption that Nature intended an even-sided, tapering foot. On the contrary, the natural foot gradually expands in breadth from the instep to the toes and, in the skeleton itself, the great toe is the longest.

"There is no law of beauty," says Dr. Ellis, "which makes it necessary to reduce the foot to even-sided symmetry. An architect required to provide more space on one than on the other side of a building would not seek to conceal or even to minimize the difference; he would seek rather to accentuate it, and give the two sides of the structure distinctive features….Moreover, the sense of symmetry is, or ought to be, satisfied by the exact correspondence of the two feet, which, taken jointly, may be described as the two halves of an unequally expanded dome."—E. B. S.