Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 46.djvu/159

Rh conformation oftener than those of other nations is not precisely proved, but we are inclined to think that such is the fact. Certainly the shallow chest is present in the case of many girls examined by the writer.

The second noticeable feature, the lack of bodily symmetry, is a patent fact to all physicians who have been called upon to make physical examinations of the bodies of children, and the art of the dressmaker is continually required to conceal defects of this nature. They arise partly from habits of faulty postures in school or at home during the plastic period of growth, and largely from the coincident lack of muscular vigor which is due to the absence of proper training. From twenty-five to thirty per cent of all cases examined by the writer exhibit some degree of unsymmetrical development of the body, many of these cases showing a degree of lateral curvature of the spine, more or less marked, according to the influences which have been at work. It is a noteworthy fact that children are not born deformed, and therefore most of these minor asymmetries assume special importance as being acquired mainly through faulty hygienic conditions of environment which obviously call for every counteracting influence at our command.

The third deficiency we noted in the development of our city girl is the lack of muscle. With this we are also concerned—first, because a girl who has small muscular strength is continually living below her capacity for usefulness as well as pleasure; and second, because the external muscles of the body are the natural outlets for excessive nervous energy, as well as the great stimulators of the functions of circulation, digestion, and respiration, while the internal muscles are so widely distributed in the great organs of the body that their vigorous condition is absolutely necessary for its health. We have physiological reasons for believing that internal muscular structures often partake of the same flaccidity and nervelessness as is sometimes exhibited by the external muscles; the softened heart muscle following certain diseases or a relaxed condition of the muscular coats of the stomach is capable of working serious ill, as every practitioner can testify.

That the muscle of girls is weaker than it need be we have ample proof in the statistics of our gymnasiums, which record the physical tests of strength taken at the beginning and the end of a course of physical exercise. These tests are taken with various dynamometers, and with these we find that a short course of two or three hours weekly, extending over six months, will often double the strength of the principal muscles of the body in girls from fifteen to twenty-five years of age.

Such improvement indicates that these girls were previously