26 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ON POSTURE AND ITS INDICATIONS. 



By T. LAUDER-BRUJMTON, M. D., F. B. S. 



IN a former paper * I observed that I thought medicine lost a 

 great deal by its practitioners either not recording their ex- 

 perience at all, or not recording it in such a form as to be readily 

 available for their fellow-practitioners, or with sufficient precis- 

 ion to be really useful. As examples of vagueness and precision 

 I instanced a verbal description of a face as commonly given, 

 and a sketch containing all the features more or less precisely 

 drawn. In the present paper I have tried in a very imperfect 

 way to indicate the common postures which one meets with daily, 

 either in patients or others, and to discover the reason why those 

 postures are assumed. I have not attempted to draw the figures, 

 for this would have been beyond my powers, and probably also 



Fig. 1. 



Fig. 2. 



beyond the powers of many medical men. I have simply indi- 

 cated the position by a few simple lines such as anyone can draw. 

 This method is one which was employed with great success by the 

 late Prof. Goodsir more than thirty years ago in illustrating his 

 lectures on anatomy. In a few lines he conveyed the impression 

 of the agility of the cat as compared with the heavy movements 

 of the ox or of the elephant, and the absence of detail fixed the 

 minds of his students all the more firmly on the main facts which 

 he wished them to carry away. As we walk along the streets 

 and notice the difference of attitude in the passers-by, some with 

 head erect and agile steps convey to us at once the idea of energy 

 and activity (Fig. 1), while others with hanging heads and bended 

 knees suggest the ideas of languor, weakness, and depression (Fig. 



* On the Method of Zaiig in Medicine. The Lancet, January 2, 1892. 



