VOL. XXXIII.] PHILOSOPHICAL TRANSACTIONS. 25 



exercise for only a quarter of an hour, at 7'^ 14"' he fell short almost as much 

 as before. On the 27th, having sat up late with some friends, he was faint, 

 and felt himself heavy on the ground, and without any spring, and at 9 next 

 morning he did not reach the nail, though he had used no exercise. He rode 

 out, but could not reach it that day. On the 28th he rode about 4 miles ; and 

 whereas at 6 that morning he reached the nail, he had lost -^v of an inch by 8. 

 Sept. 19th he came from Oxford a little tired, and next morning at 8 wanted 4- 

 an inch. After studying closely, though he never stirred from the writing-desk, 

 yet in 5 or 6 hours he lost near an inch All the difference between labourers 

 and sedentary people is, that the former are longer in losing their morning 

 height, and sink rather less in the whole than the latter. When the height is 

 lost, it can be regained by any rest that day, or by the use of the cold bath. 



The alteration in the human stature, it seems proceeds from the yielding of 

 the cartilages between the vertebrae, to the weight of the body in an erect 

 posture. 



Some Remarks on the foregoing Observation. By Mr. IP'illiam Beckett, Surgeon, 

 F. R. S. N" 383, p. 89. 



The remarkable difference in the stature of human bodies, in the space of a 

 inw hours time, Mr. B. found to be fact, by several experiments. He further 

 observed, that in young persons the alteration has been more considerable than 

 in those that are aged. The trials equally succeeding in a sitting as in a stand- 

 ing posture, will naturally lead us to believe, that it must necessarily be from 

 the trunk of the body, or some of its parts, that this remarkable alteration is 

 brought about. 



There is something so surprising in the structure and disposition of the spine, 

 that nothing but such a peculiar contrivance could so curiously have fitted it for 

 the respective uses and purposes it was ordained for. The thickness and short- 

 ness of the bones, with the intervening cartilages, assisted by the boney pro- 

 cesses, dispose it to a motion peculiar to itself. Whereas had the bones 

 been of any considerable length, on bending the body, the articulations must 

 have made a large angle on their inmost edges, and the spinal-marrow have been 

 continually liable to be injured ; or had the cartilages been entirely wanting, it 

 would have been as useless as if it were but one bone ; so that being rendered 

 incapable of bending the trunk of the body, it must have always remained in 

 an erect posture. But by the present disposition of its parts, it is not only 

 absolutely secured again>t any such inconveniencies, but, though so small a 



VOL. VII. E 



