THE HUMAN FOOT 79 



Zoologically speaking, we may say that the very useful 

 and specialized foot adapted for terrestrial progression 

 is a foot of few digits. It may, in fact, be a foot composed 

 of a solitary digit. The evolutionary stages by which 

 the horse has come to stand solely upon its third digit 

 are well known. Similar processes produced the two- 

 digited foot of the deer and of the ostrich. There can 

 be no doubt that Man is trusting, not to his third digit, 

 but to his first, and all the others are undergoing a 

 process of comparative atrophy. This is in reality a 

 most interesting problem. There is an admitted tendency 

 to specialize one digit in a thoroughly adapted terrestrial 

 foot. Man applied an arboreal foot to terrestrial pro- 

 gression, and in this arboreal foot the best-developed 

 member Avas the old grasping digit— the first or big toe. 

 It seems that upon taking to a terrestrial life he has. 

 started the elaboration of this already specialized toe, and 

 is tending towards the development of a foot which is quite 

 unique — a foot in which the first digit is the dominant, 

 and in the end, perhaps, the sole surviving, member. 



It needs no special demonstration to make plain the 

 fact that the little toe is somewhat of a rudiment in most 

 Europeans. Usually it is but a poor thing; its nail is. 

 ill developed, and at times no nail is present. It is 

 particularly liable to that circulatory disturbance which 

 manifests itself in chilblains, and not uncommonlv it 

 seems in a poor state of nutrition. Most people possess 

 but little power of movement in it, and its skeleton 

 shows that its atrophic condition has affected the bones 

 and joints, for the last two phalanges are very commonly 

 fused together, making it short of a joint as compared 

 with the rest of the toes. Very commonly its axis is not 

 straight, and the toe is humped up and also somewhat 

 bent laterally. 



It is easy to assume that all this is merely the result of 

 wearing boots, but it is perfectly certain that this common 

 explanation is not the correct one. 



