166 MARRIAGE AND HEREDITY 



selves to the tortures of tight-lacing, which among 

 short squat races is unknown. 



As the great function of women is to bear children, 

 a full development of hips and bosom, meaning easy 

 accouchements and plenty of nourishment for the off- 

 spring, is everywhere an accepted element of female 

 beauty. At the same time excessive stoutness is 

 abhorred, because it implies sterility, or at least a 

 decline of activity or muscular power. The fashion- 

 able lady of London or Paris who artificially adds to 

 her figure obeys an instinct that she would blush to 

 acknowledge. She has probably never realised the 

 meaning of the "padded hips and bosoms" that 

 inspired Schopenhauer with one of his bitterest sar- 

 casms at the expense of the sex. A red nose is fatal 

 to a woman's charms, because it signifies some con- 

 stitutional defect of a transmissible character, but a 

 lover has no difficulty in reconciling himself to the 

 temporary disfigurement of his mistress arising from 

 illness or accident. 



"While some of the constituents of male and female 

 beauty are necessarily unchanging, others are subject 

 to modification by circumstances in a pretty marked 

 degree, not merely as between one race and another, but 

 among the members of a given race within a historical 



