TUBERCULAR DISEASE. 199 



though liable to early decay, and the eyes are large 

 and full, the pupils being widely dilated and the 

 white of the eye beautifully clear. The eyelashes are 

 long, curved, and silky, and the blue veins show 

 distinctly through the clear thin skin ; the bones are 

 light, the hands and feet well formed, the stature 

 often tall, and the whole figure slightly and grace- 

 fully built. Persons of this type generally remain 

 spare, and they have a strong dislike to every kind 

 of fatty food. They are vivacious and excitable, and 

 the intellectual faculties are often highly developed. 

 Even at an early age children of this temperament in 

 many cases show a marvellous intellectual activity, 

 and it is observation of the regularity with which 

 such precocious tubercular children die that has given 

 rise to the common saying, when speaking of excep- 

 tionally clever children, that they may be " too wise 

 to live long." 



These persons are wanting in stamina in the widest 

 sense of the term. They are incapable of prolonged 

 exertion either of mind or body, and break down 

 under conditions which would not prove injurious to 

 the healthy. They are continually taking "colds," 

 and are specially prone all through life to affections of 

 an inflammatory character. 



Although large families are often born to parents 

 of this type, the children are deficient in vital force, 

 and are carried off in such numbers during infancy by 

 convulsions, brain fever, water on the brain, exhaust- 

 ing diarrhoea, and other ailments, that only a small 



