ANTHROPOLOGY OF EASTERN EUROPEAN JEWS 203 



the healthy development of their muscular system and their 

 chests remain flat and contracted. It must be recalled that the 

 girth depends not only on the size of the skeleton, but also, in 

 a great measure, on the condition of the muscular system. 

 Well developed muscles will enlarge the circumference of the 

 chest with their bulk, and weak, flabby muscles do not elevate 

 the ribs upwards to a perceptible extent, and permit them to 

 hang down at an acute angle in relation to the spinal column, 

 thus reducing the size of the girth. Individuals with strong, 

 well-developed muscles have consequently large chests. The 

 absence of agricultural laborers among the Jews is also an im- 

 portant factor. The rural population is known to have a larger 

 girth than the town dweller, as is the case with the factory 

 worker, who is at a disadvantage in this regard when compared 

 with the outdoor laborer. It has also been observed that the 

 more intellectual classes are quite often deficient in respect to 

 their girth, and Otto Ammon, speaking of this condition, men- 

 tions that the Jews are deficient in their chest capacity, because 

 they are assiduously engaged in study in a sitting posture, and 

 also because they are very frequently engaged in mercantile pur- 

 suits.^ He ascribes this defect of the physical organization of 

 the Jews mostly to their faulty muscular development. 



For 1 1 8 native Jews of New York City we have found the 

 average circumference of the chest to be 88.09 ^^-j which is 

 more than 2 cm. larger than that of the immigrant Jews in this 

 city, but when considered in relation to stature we find no im- 

 provement at all. As the average stature of the native Jews is 

 1,679 nim., the girth is only 52.46 percent of the body-height, 

 which is about the same as that of their foreign parents. This 

 confirms Ripley's opinion that, even if granted that the narrow 

 chest of the Jews is an acquired characteristic, the effect of long- 

 continued subjection to unfavorable sanitary and social environ- 

 ment, it has none the less become a hereditary trait. 



The relations of stature to girth is interesting. Pantukhof 

 has observed in Odessa, South Russia, that the chest of the 

 taller Jews was more capacious than that of the Jews of inferior 



1 Otto Amnion, " Die naturliche Auslese beim Menschen," Jena, 1893, p. 134. 



