142 REPORT 1871. 



adiilts, and the quantity of the several foods allowed in -workhouses. Children 

 under two years of age get milk, bread, and rice-pudding daily. From two to five 

 years, pudding on three days, meat and potatoes on three days, and soup or other 

 food on one day. From five to nine years there is one other day of meat and po- 

 tatoes, and commonly one of soup instead of pudding. From nine to sixteen that 

 of adults. For able-bodied, bread and gruel at breakfast and supper, varied by 

 broth or cheese in the several localities ; at dinner, meat in some form on four davs, 

 and pudding or cheese on three days. For aged, tea and bread and butter at break- 

 fast and supper ; at dinner, meat in some form on five days, with pudding or cheese 

 or other food on two days. The standard of measiu-emeut of the sufficiency of this 

 food is that which he gave to the Government when advising on the Lancashire 

 cotton-famine, viz. 4300 grains of carbon and 200 grains of nitrogen daily ; and the 

 model dietary which he had framed for workhouses in the Midland Counties sup- 

 plied more than this to the adults. He then pointed out that, whilst the above- 

 mentioned quantity of food supported the health and strength of tlie imnates, except' 

 perhaps as regards children, there are still many workhouses where the dietary is 

 very unsatisfactory. In some, gTuel and bread are given at breakfast and supper 

 to nearly all the inmates, or where meat in a separate form is not given, or where 

 a very small quantity, as 2 oz. or 3 oz. of raw meat was allowed two or three times 

 a week, or where bread and cheese alone are given to some classes in eighteen out 

 of twenty-one meals weekly, or where soup containing no meat is given thrice a 

 week, or where meat when gi^'en is given only when cold ; whilst, on the other 

 hand, there are workhouses in the manufacturing districts where meat and bread 

 are given in great excess. He was of opinion that the time may arrive when the 

 Government will prepare several schemes of dietary for difierent parts of the 

 comitry ; but in the meantime improvements are now in rapid progress. He ex- 

 hibited tables showing the quantities of food taken by the worlring classes in every 

 county of England and in Wales, and the dietary which he had recommended for 

 use in workhouses in the Midland Counties ; and he also read the details of the 

 dietary which Professor Christison had devised for the Edinburgh charity work- 

 house in 1854, supplying oatmeal and buttermilk at breakfast and supper, and meat 

 soup with bread at dinner. 



On some Rudimentary Structures recenth/ met ivith in the Dissection of a 

 large Fin- Whale. B)j Prof. STRUxnERs. 



The whale was a specimen of the Eazorback (Balcpnoptera Ifuscuhts), G4 feet in 

 length. It was found dead in the North Sea, off Aberdeen, and towed into Peter- 

 head. Searching for a rudiment of the hind limb, the author found it represented 

 by a bone attached by ligaments to the external process of the pelvic bone. He 

 found a sixteenth pair of ribs. The first rib had articulated to it a capitular process 

 4 to 5 inches in length. The flexor and extensor muscles of the fingers were^^arefidly 

 dissected. The muscles found were the homologues of the following muscles in 

 man : — fiexor carpi ulnaris, flexor profundus digitorum, flexor longus pollicis, ex- 

 tensor communis digitorum. The flexor carpi ulnaris was inserted into a distinct 

 and moveable pisiform cartilage. These muscles the author regarded as rudimentary 

 structures, whose function was not extinct but low ; not to be explained by notions 

 of final cause or of so-called type, but by inheritance and the influence of fimction ; 

 the one, as part of a great scheme of evolution, accounted for their existence, the 

 other, by fitness and use, had preserved them from becoming extinct. 



On the Cervical Vertehrce in Cetacea. By Prof. Strtjthees. 



The paper was directed chiefly to the consideration of the various conditions of 

 stiffness and mobility of the vertebrae, and the various degrees of development of the 

 transverse processes. The seven vertebriB were present as a mammalian affinity, 

 and their conditions are modified by function. The surgeon gives his patient a 

 moveable or a stitt'joint according as he desires, by practising either rest or motion, 

 and the same law would no doubt act in the whale s neck. " The great ring of the 

 transverse processes contains a large vascular plexus, as it contains an arteiy in 



