' 'V ; ^...^:.. 



284 APPENDIX. 



appreciable difference in the length of the column at dif- 

 ferent times. In young persons, the elasticity is much 

 greater than in the aged, these parts gradually harden- 

 ing with the years a person lives, until the spine finally 

 looses a great proportion of its flexibility, and in these 

 circumstances, there is very little diurnal difference in 

 the length of the column. But in youthful persons, the 

 difference in the length, especially if they are tall, be- 

 tween morning and evening, may be from half, to a quar- 

 ter of an inch, and may be found by the common mode 

 of measuring. Thus do we grow taller during the night, 

 and shorter during the day. 



Now these cartilages, being thus compressible and 

 elastic, in young persons, but gradually hardening with 

 age, it is plain, that if one edge, or side, in such a one 

 be pressed more than the other, and this pressure be 

 continued for any considerable length of time, they will 

 not grow of a uniform thickness, the part thus pressed 

 becoming thinner, and the opposite part thicker than 

 natural. Without reference to growth, the same effect 

 would be produced by the pressure of, and the gradual 

 hardening of these parts. Therefore, if the spinal col- 

 umn be bent into any unnatural shape, and the same pos- 

 ture be continued day after day, and month after month, 

 as is too often the case with young ladies at school, the 

 cartilagious plates will finally become wedge shaped, 

 having a thick and a thin edge, and as they harden with 

 age, they will continue to operate as wedges in retain- 

 ing the spine in that crooked state by which they were 

 forced into this form : and thus the person will probably 

 become deformed for the remainder of her life, in spite 

 of all the frames, pullies, and weights, or other Procrus- 

 tean apparatus, which may be applied to remedy the 

 evil. 



This effect would be produced in such persons as had 

 not arrived at the age, when the cartilages become hard. 

 But in those who are quite young, as from infancy to 

 12, or 14 years, even the bones of the spinal column 

 being still comparatively soft, would conform more or 

 lass, to the curvature given it, thus making a deformity 

 from which there is not the slightest hope of relief, since 



