52 LAW OF WEIGHT. 



wve. In former times, when it was necessary to make use of a ramrod in loading a 

 musket, men of a certain height were absolutely necessary for the service; but in these 

 (lays of breech-loading arms, a man from 6 feet to 5 feet 4 inches in stature, and well 

 proportioned in build and weight, is, ccBteris paribus, as serviceable a soldier as can be 

 desired. 



The instructions delivered to enrolling surgeons during the war of the rebellion 

 contained no injunctions as to weight. As a matter of course, it was duly considered 

 in the estimate of "physical fitness" of the conscript; but, unfortunately for the purpo^jc 

 of Ihe present investigation, it was not an obligatory process, and a large part of the 

 returns contain no entry upon the subject. Some energetic officers, lioweA^er, saw fit 

 to make their work complete by adding the particulars of weight to the other details 

 gi\en, and i'rom their records the tables in -which weight is a component were completed. 

 It is reasonable to assume, as the information was voluntarily furnished, that it was 

 procured with due accuracy. The men when weighed were invariably quite naked. 



As early as in 1835, Quetelet pointed out the law of weight.* In his last and 

 greatest work, he elaborates the siibject quite extensively. He states that in a large 

 nundjer of men (10,000, for example) of the same nativity, of like age, and subjected 

 to similar external surroundings, the same imiformity prevails as to weight that has 

 been demonstrated to exist as to stature. Weights thus obtained will range themselves 

 so as to form the curve well known as the binomial curve of Newton. Its axis of 

 aljscissas is the scale of increase of man, (in height, weight, strength, or other measur- 

 able qualities,) from the dwarf to the giant. These abscissas have for ordinates the 

 physical qualities just enumerated, and the number at each degree or step is repre- 

 sented by the length of the ordinate. The curve of stature derived by Quetelet from 

 his observations of an autochthonous race is quite symmetrical ; but he found that 

 weight produced a curve of which the shoulders were uneven.^ 



The weight of the new-born child increases for a while nearly as the cube of its 

 height; after the fii'st year, that increase becomes less rapid; and, toward the fourth or 

 fifth year, its value is between the second and thirtl })ower of the stature Toward 

 puberty, the relative weight has the least development ; but, about that period, it again 

 increases. At oO years, or at the period of attainment of full growth, the relative 

 weight has a value which would be nearly intermediate between a calcixlation of 

 increase as the square of the stature and another as the cube of the stature.'^ 



In view of the limited number of records of weight in our possession, and the 

 varying n;)ti\ities represented in- them, it was not to be expected that Quetelet's law 

 would admit of application. In the case of the white natives of the United States, the 

 curve is of a character to make it certain that a larger number of observations would 

 have led to a satisfactory result. 



'S«r I'homme i-t le devehppement de ees facuUis : ou (.ssai de physique «ocio'e, 2 vols, 8vo., Paris, 1*335, vol. II, pp. 53, 61, 

 ^Atithroponwtrie, p. 340. 

 Hbid., p. 34.^). 



