Page:Transactions of the College of Physicians of Philadelphia (ser 03 vol 05).djvu/199

 FOOT-BINDING IN CIUN'A.

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The power of the bandage is well shoAvn in the foot-binding- process, and teaches ns a lesson in ortho- paedic surgery. If deformity is thus produced, the opposite may be, where the same is presented for treatment and removal. The sjrtay-foot is the con-. verse of the Chinese deformity, and might be removed by the same, or a modification of the same, method, and so of other unsightly or disabling natural defects of the feet.

One of the most singular results of the foot-binding is the extreme attenuation of the leg from the knee downward, involving as it does both bones and muscles. The latter are affected chiefly from want of use, the shrinkage of the gastrocnemius being most apparent; and the former appear to retain their childhood dimensions, or arc reduced to even less than this, the tibia and fibula bein^ no thicker than the radius and ulna, as shown in the dried foot here pre- sented. Where the binding is commenced very early, this condition is much more marked than in the cases of the poor in whom it is begun at a much more matured age.

The effect upon the emotional nature of the Chinese has been dwelt upon by some writers, who claim that the foot-binding changes the entire character of its victims, and gives even a peculiar expression to their features, bringing them in marked contrast with those in whom the feet have not been compressed. This is attributed to the sufferings of the formative period, and the life of forced inactivity which it entails as a result. No doubt the want of open-air exercise is a considerable drawback to the measure of health of the small-footed women, and renders them in many