Dicted to the study of character through the handwriting. With such
abundant materials before them, they would doubtless be able to
determine the height and general proportions of their unseen
correspondents. In the article of height, many men correspond to the
minutest portion of an inch; but in the other proportions of the figure,
it would seem that no two human beings are alike. So great is the
disparity in persons of the same height, that the trunk of an individual
of five feet and a half, is occasionally found to be as long as that of
a man of six feet. In fact, Mr Macdonald, in an early period of his
measurements, was so confounded by the difference in the proportions,
that he at once came to the conclusion, that our population is made up
of mixed tribes of mankind. In the midst of all this diversity, the
question was, What were the proper proportions? or, in other words, What
proportions constituted a handsome figure? and here our vestiarian
philosopher was for a long time at a loss. At length, however, he took
300 measurements, without selection, including the length of the trunk,
of the head and neck, and of the fork, and adding them all together,
struck the average: from which it resulted, that the average head and
neck gives 10-1/2 inches; trunk, 25 inches; and fork, 32 inches; making
the whole figure, from the crown of the head to the sole of the _shoe_,
5 feet 7-1/2 inches. The word we have italicised is the drawback: a
tailor measures with the shoes on; and Mr Macdonald can only approximate
to the truth when he deducts half an inch for the sole, and declares the
average height of our population to be five feet seven inches. On this
basis, however, he constructed a scale of beauty applying to all
heights: If a man of 5 feet 7 inches give 10-1/2 inches for head and
neck, 25 for trunk, and 31-1/2 for fork, wha
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