Comments on Sterne. 79 
car ne fcait-onpas qu’on les peut rompre tres 
« aifément, en cas qu’elles ne Je fuffent pas, apres 
** quo on peut toucher effectivement fon Corps.’* 
This writer has alfo mentionéd the mifchievous 
effect of {trong preffure applied to t!e heads of very 
young Children; which is connected with another 
theory that Sterne has diverted himfelf with. I 
have not met with the original of it in my reading, 
but will give a paflage from Bulwer’s Anthropo- 
metamorphofis, analogous to Mauriceau’s. 
The North-weft paflage to Learning, obfcurely 
mentioned in the Triftra-~Pedia, is defcribed by Dr. 
Warton, in his excellent obfervations on the Genius 
and Writings of Pope, and was well burlefqued 
by Swift, in the Voyage to Laputa.? 
The 
*Mauric, Maladies des Femmes Groffes, p. 347 (edit. gme. 
4to. 1681.) 
+ I knewa Gentleman who had divers fons, and the Mid- 
wives and Nurfes had with headbands and ftrokings fo alter’d 
the natural mould oftheir heads, that they proved children ofa 
very weak underftanding. Hislaft fon only, upon advice given 
him, had no reftraint impofed upon the natural growth of his 
head, but was left free from the coercive power of head- 
bands and other artificial violence, whofe head, although 
it were bigger, yet he had more wit and uuderftanding 
than them all. : 
Artificial Changeling, p. 42. 
$ See the Defcription and Print of the literary turning 
Machine, . 
