FASHION IN DEFORMITY. 



737 



outer toes under the sole of the foot, so that the first or great toe alone 

 retains its normal position, and a narrow point is produced in front : 

 2. Compressing the roots of the toes and the heel downward and 

 toward one another so as greatly to shorten the foot, and produce a 

 deep transverse fold in the middle of the sole (Fig. 14). The whole 

 has now the appearance of the hoof of some animal rather than a 

 human foot, and affords a very inefficient organ of support, as the pe- 

 culiar tottering gait of those possessing it clearly shows. 



But strange as this custom seems to us, it is only a slight step in 

 excess of what the majority of people in Europe subject themselves 

 and their children to. From personal observation of a large number 

 of feet of persons of all ages and of all classes of society in our own 

 country, I do not hesitate to say that there are very few, if any, to be 



Fig. 13. Section of Natural Foot with the Bones, and a cor- 

 responding Section op a Chinese Deformed Foot. The 

 outline of the latter is dotted, and the bones shaded. 



Fig. 14. Sole op 

 Chinese Wo- 

 man's Foot. 



met with that do not, in some degree, bear evidence of having been 

 subjected to a compressing influence more or less injurious. Let any 

 one take the trouble to inquire into what a foot ought to be. For 

 external form look at any of the antique models the nude Hercules 

 Farnese or the sandaled Apollo Belvedere ; watch the beautiful free- 

 dom of motion in the wide-spreading toes of an infant ; consider the 

 wonderful mechanical contrivances for combining strength with mo- 

 bility, firmness with flexibility ; the numerous bones, articulations, 

 ligaments ; the great toe, with seven special muscles to give it that 

 versatility of motion which was intended that it should possess and 

 then see what a miserable, stiffened, distorted thing is this same foot, 

 when it has been submitted for a number of years to the " improving " 

 process to which our civilization condemns it : the toes all squeezed 

 and flattened against each other ; the great toe no longer in its normal 

 position, but turned outward, pressing so upon the others that one or 



TOL. XVII. 47 



