MEASUREMENTS OF MEN. 53 



gilt window-plate is hinged ; it may thus be adjusted to any position 

 and inclined at will according to the direction from which the light 

 comes. 



A simple and moderately satisfactory stereoscope may be impro- 

 vised by unscrewing the concave eye-pieces from an ordinary opera- 

 glass, and looking through it at the stereograph, which must be held 

 about six inches from the centers of the object-glasses and parallel to 

 the line connecting these. Vision by this method, however, is very 

 uncomfortable if the stereograph be large. The instrument is a crude 

 Helmholtz stereoscope, but it needs adjusting-screws at both ends of 

 each tube to make it entirely satisfactory. The only objection to Dr. 

 Holmes's instrument is the absence of adjustment ; but, despite this 

 defect, it is deservedly used everywhere in our country. Quietly and 

 unselfishly he has done far more for the stereoscope in America than 

 has ever been credited him by those who enjoy the fruits of his spon- 

 taneous and unpaid ingenuity. 



+*+- 



MEASUREMENTS OF MEN. 



By FRANCIS G ALTON, F. B. S. 



WHEN shall we have anthropometric laboratories, where a man may 

 from time to time get himself and his children weighed, meas- 

 ured, and rightly photographed, and have each of their bodily faculties 

 tested, by the best methods known to modern science ? In the Janu- 

 ary number of this " Review " I endeavored to show the advantages 

 of photographic chronicles maintained from childhood to age, and how 

 they should be made and preserved ; in the present memoir I propose 

 to briefly speak upon the anthropometric and medical facts that might 

 properly be recorded by the side of the photographs in the family 

 records to which I there referred. I shall endeavor to define the scope 

 of what may be effected in this direction, partly by accurate apparatus 

 now extant, and partly in a rougher and less effective way, owing to 

 the present want of appropriate apparatus. In doing so the instru- 

 mental and other desiderata will be pointed out that seem most easily 

 capable of being supplied, if the attention of a few persons interested 

 in the matter could be brought to bear on the subject Two things 

 are at present needed a desire among many persons to have them- 

 selves and their children accurately appraised, and an effort among a 

 few scientific persons who have the special knowledge required for the 

 purpose to systematize the methods by which this could best be done. 

 There appears at length to be a somewhat general concurrence of 

 opinion that the possibilities of a child's future career are more nar- 

 rowly limited than our forefathers were fondly disposed to believe. I 



