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, what should another give, of
6 feet, or any other height? The approximation of a man's actual
measurement to this rule of three determines his pretensions in the
way of symmetry; and the inventor of the _shibboleth_ has found it so
far to answer, that a figure coming near the rule invariably pleases
the eye, and gives the assurance of a handsome man. Independently of
this advantage, a man of such proportions has great strength, and is
able to withstand the fatigue of violent exercise for a longer period
than one less symmetrically formed.

The term 'adult,' however, used by Mr Macdonald to designate those he
measured,