PRESIDENTS ADDRESS. 545 
while from 12 to 134 years the growth is certainly retarded. 
Mr. Charles Roberts believes the more probable explana- 
tion is, that boys “do not live under such favourable con- 
ditions for their regular bodily development as girls.” In 
England boys are sent to boarding schools at an earlier 
age, and their education is more persistent and severe, from 
a sanitary point of view, than that of their sisters; they 
receive less care and protection in the home life, and are 
frequently subjected to laborious physical occupations at 
an early age. Their bones thus are often prematurely 
consolidated. Moreover, they are sometimes underfed, as 
well as overworked, at an age when all their develop- 
mental energy should be spent in growth. The differences 
of growth due to difference in race are very important, 
but as the non-Anglo-Celtic strain is very small in these 
States any comparison of racial peculiarities based upon 
local observations would necessarily have little value. The 
scope of the anthropometrist working in Australia must 
therefore lie principally in noting the differences which 
develop themselves in people of the same race living under 
different social conditions; and I think Australian observa- 
tions will tend to confirm the conclusions of observers 
elsewhere, that not to heredity, but to environment, must 
be attributed the major differences that are discernible 
among children of the same race who are born healthy. 
The -observations which I have so far been able to make 
have not been sufficiently numerous to enable me to arrive 
at any firm conclusions beyond these :— 
First.—That the children of the non-labouring classes 
are physically more robust than the children of the 
labouring classes ; 
Second.—That hindrances to yrowth show themselves 
at an early age; and 
Third.—That many of the conditions that make for 
evil may be removed or greatly modified in their 
action. 
I now propose to give the results of the measurement of 
some 2000 children made in Sydney during last year. The 
number measured form but a small proportion of the child- 
ren of the State, but they are well representative of the 
various social grades to be found in Sydney, and I hope 
some day to be able to record the observation of 25,000 
others. 
The card herewith circulated shows the description of 
the measurements made. It will be seen that besides the 
information necessary for the identification of the child 
the following particulars were obtained :—As regards the 
L2 
