Theories and Experiments 303 



a sternum 227 mm. long, with a thoracic circumference of 895 mm., 

 measured immediately above the nipples. 



On the other hand, my researches permit me to state in a general 

 way that to find the same chest dimensions in the Creoles, the height 

 had to increase from 168 to 173 centimeters. (Vol. I, p. 317.) 



So the point is really not so much an unusually large thoracic 

 capacity as a shorter height, or, to speak more exactly, lower 

 limbs which are shorter in proportion to the height of the trunk. 



But let us return to the inquiries of Dr. Gosse. 



M. Gosse follows his shrewd observations on this interesting 

 point by a questionnaire on mountain sickness, which I think it 

 best to quote here verbatim: 



The study of the influence exerted by the rarefied air of high 

 altitudes in the Peruvian Andes upon the physiological constitution of 

 their inhabitants naturally leads us to the study of symptoms produced 

 by this cause in persons foreign to the plateaux, who are exposed to 

 it imprudently or too suddenly, and of the measures which are used 

 to combat the symptoms or at least to moderate their effects. 



If the symptoms observed in our European Alps, to which the 

 name of mountain sickness has been given, are limited in general to 

 extreme breathlessness, accompanied by headache, throbbing of the 

 carotids, palpitations, nausea, disturbance of the digestive functions, 

 great lassitude and sometimes syncope, the symptoms appearing in the 

 Andes of Peru, known by the names of soroche, mareo, or veta, reached 

 such violence, they say, that they deserve the attention of physicians 

 who are explorers, all the more because sufficient analysis has not yet 

 been made, in this connection, of the mechanism of the action, usually 

 combined, of the decrease of the oxygen in the air and of the atmos- 

 pheric pressure, of the eventual drop in temperature caused by easier 

 radiation of heat, of the absence of humidity, and especially of the 

 unnatural strain on the muscles, and because, as explanation of the 

 anomalies, there has been a tendency to suspect the existence in Peru 

 of special unknown causes, which would not be found elsewhere. 



Observations carefully made and new records thoroughly verified 

 would end doubts and reconcile opinions. With this purpose we are 

 propounding the following questions: 



1. What are the characteristic symptoms of the soroche of the 

 Peruvian Andes, with reference to the nervous, circulatory, pulmonary, 

 or muscular systems? 



2. What is the normal sequence of these symptoms, in the com- 

 monest cases, and which are the predominating ones? 



3. Are there premonitory symptoms of the acute attack, and what 

 are they? 



4. Is a tendency to nasal, labial, pulmonary, ocular, cutaneous, 

 etc., hemorrhages noted frequently at very great elevations? 



5. Are a congested condition of the cornea and erythema of the 

 face observed, in the absence of reflected light from the snow? 



6. Does the skin take on a livid or cyanosed shade at an eleva- 



