Human physiology / by John Elliotson ; with which is incorporated, much of the elementary part of the Institutiones physiologiae of J. F. Blumenbach, M.D., F.R.S.

  • Elliotson, John, 1791-1868.
Date:
1835
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Human physiology / by John Elliotson ; with which is incorporated, much of the elementary part of the Institutiones physiologiae of J. F. Blumenbach, M.D., F.R.S. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The University of Glasgow Library. The original may be consulted at The University of Glasgow Library.

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    vered in a wild and solitary state, there is no well authenticated instance of one whose progression was on all-fours.^ If we at- tempt this mode of progression, we move either on'the knees or the points of the toes, throwing the legs obliquely back to a considerable distance; we find ourselves insecure and uneasy; our eyes, instead of looking forwards, are directed to the ground; and the openings of the nostrils are no longer at the lower part of the nose,— in a situation to receive ascending odorous particles, but lie behind it. Our inferior extremities, being of much greater length, in proportion to the others and to the trunk, than the posterior of brutes with four extremities, even in children in whom the proportion is less, are evidently not intended to coin- cide with them in movement; they are much stronger than the arms, obviously for the purpose of great support: the presence ot calves, which are found in man alone, shows that the legs are to support and move the whole machine; the thigh bones are in the same line with the trunk, in quadrupeds they form an angle, frequently an acute one; the bones of the tarsus become haid and perfect sooner than those of the carpus, because strength ot leg is required for standing and walking sooner than strength of arm and hand for labour; the great toe is of the highest import- ance to the erect posture, and bestowed exclusively on mankind ; the os calcis is very large, particularly at its posterior projection, for the insertion of the strong muscles of the calf, and lies at right angles with the leg; we alone can rest fully upon it, and in fact upon the whole of the tarsus, metatarsus, and toes. The superior extremities do not lie under the trunk as they would if destined for its support, but on its sides, capable of motion in every direction towards objects ; the fore-arm extends itself out- wards, not forwards, as in quadrupeds, where it is an organ of progression; the hand is fixed not at right angles with the arm, as an instrument of support, but in the same line, and cannot be extended to a right angle without painfully stretching the flexor tendons ; the superior extremity is calculated in the erect As ’twas in Germany made good B’ a boy that lost himself in a wood, And growing to a man was wont With wolves upon all-four to hunt.” Hiutibras, part ii. canto i.