Part 5
The muscles are a very great assistance to the ligaments, forasmuch as, by placing and retaining the joints in proper positions, they regulate the direction in which forces are brought to bear upon the ligaments. Moreover, by steadying or bracing the joints, they check or break the force and prevent its being suddenly imposed upon the ligaments. And the muscles, by virtue of their contractile property, have the capability of becoming tight in any position of the joint, which is an immense advantage; whereas a ligament having no contractility and, usually, no elasticity, is tight only in one position. The office of a ligament is to limit the movement of a joint in a particular direction; and, till the joint has assumed a certain position--till it is bent or straightened to a certain angle--the ligament does not come into play. During the bending or straightening of a limb the muscles regulate the movement, and bring it to a stop or check it before it has gone to its full extent; and, thus, the ligament is relieved from that sudden imposition of force which would result if it were required to check the movement of a joint in its full swing.
Accordingly, when the muscles are prepared and in proper action, that is, when they place the joint in a suitable position and duly support or brace it, a sprain very rarely occurs. It is when the muscles are unprepared, when we make a false step, or when the foot encounters an unexpected obstacle, and the weight falls suddenly upon the ligaments in an unfavourable direction, that a sprain occurs. A man jumps from a considerable height, or descends deep steps with a heavy weight upon his back, and no harm results; but he slips off the curb-stone, or treads unwarily upon a piece of orange-peel, or turns his foot hastily, to avoid some object on the ground, and sprains his ankle.
In order that they may do their work well, be alert, and maintain good guard, the muscles need to be kept in practice. A person unaccustomed to throw a ball is very liable to sprain his elbow with the sudden jerk which is required for that feat; or if a person takes to tumbling and jumping, without proper training, he will probably suffer for his temerity. Again, common experience tells us that a joint which has been sprained is, for a long time, liable to be sprained again. This is because the part remains tender as well as weak; and the muscles do not brace it steadily and firmly, or come nimbly to its aid when it is in danger.
In consequence of the foot, in walking, being placed upon the ground with the toes slanting a little outwards, the _out_er and hinder edge of the heel first touches the ground. Hence this part of the heel of the shoe is usually worn down before the remainder. The ball of the little toe next comes to the ground, and the balls of the other toes follow in quick succession; and it is from the great toe--that is, from the inner side of the foot--that the last impulse is given to propel the body, forwards, over the other foot. In order to give full effect to this final impulse an especial muscle, the “Long Fibular” muscle (I in fig. 13), is provided. The tendon (i) of this muscle passes, behind the outer ankle, beneath the sole of the foot, to the great toe. It has the effect of pressing the ball of the great toe upon the ground, while it raises the outer ankle, and so contributes to throw the weight, across, in the direction of the other foot.
Thus the foot revolves upon the ground, from the heel to the balls of the toes, and from the outer edge of the former to the inner edge of the latter; and during the revolution, which has been compared, though the comparison fails in many points, to the revolving of the segment of a wheel, the ankle is raised and advanced forwards.
On the complete and steady execution of this movement good walking chiefly depends, more particularly upon the full performance of the last stage of the process, viz. the rising fairly upon the balls of the toes and delivering the weight steadily over to the other foot. This is the most difficult part of the process, the whole weight of the body during its execution being borne upon the fore part of the foot, that is, upon the longer pillar of the plantar arch; forasmuch as the heel is being raised and the other foot is off the ground. For the good performance of this part of the process, all the features of the well-made foot are essential. There must be a high and firm plantar arch, a heel set at a proper angle, and a strong great toe running straight forwards. There must be also a fully developed calf to set the machinery well in motion.
If the plantar arch be low it cannot bear the strain attendant upon this movement; and the person, in consequence, shirks the full performance of it. He does that by turning the toes too much out; and, then, he contrives to roll over the inner side of the foot, instead of rising upon the balls of the toes; and so he gets along with short, shuffling, feeble steps. How many persons, owing to one cause or other, hobble in this way! Some turn the toes very much in, and rise over the ball of the little toe, instead of over the great toe. This is done with comparative ease, because the ball of the little toe is nearer to the ankle; but the step is, thereby, shortened, as well as rendered less firm and less graceful.
The revolving movement of the foot, or the bringing of its several parts into contact with the ground in succession, in a distinct manner, is peculiar to man. Many animals do not bear upon the heel at all; they only tread upon the toes, and are, therefore, called DIGITIGRADE. Some, indeed, bear only upon the tips of the toes, as the Horse (fig. 5, p. 15). Others go upon the balls of the toes, as the Cat, the Hare, the Pig, and the Dog. Some animals bear upon the heels as well as the toes, and are called PLANTIGRADE, as the Bear, the Badger, and the Monkey; but these all flop the sole upon the ground in its whole length at once. The foot in them is not sufficiently compact and strong to bear the weight of the body first upon one part then upon another; and they, consequently, walk in an ungainly manner, as compared with man.
_Character evinced by manner of Walking._
Bear in mind that for the firm vigorous walk there is required, not only the well-formed limb, but also the manly and determined WILL, acting in a decided and authoritative manner over the several members of the body, so that these are accustomed readily, and steadily, to obey its commands; just as the soldiers of a well-drilled regiment obey the directions of the superior officer in an orderly and efficient manner. And, as you may judge of the character of the officer by the discipline of his men, so may you form an estimate of a man by the movements of his limbs. You see a man walk along the street, and you instinctively form an opinion of him by the mode in which he carries himself and treads the ground. Be careful not to allow yourselves to be inflexibly biassed by these first impressions, as that amounts to prejudice. Nevertheless, experience tells us that they are not to be altogether despised. They originate in a perception of the working of the great laws by which body and mind are harmonized; and, if fairly estimated, they rarely deceive us.
We have little difficulty in recognising three chief classes among pedestrians. _First_, there are those who pay too much attention to the movements, who walk with a pompous strut, or a mincing gait, or affect some style or other. We are naturally very little inclined in favour of such persons; indeed, we have usually to make an effort not to be decidedly prejudiced against them. _Secondly_, there are those who pay too little attention to their movements, who do not seem to be sufficiently alive to the responsibility attaching to the possessors of so noble a structure as the human frame, and who do not give themselves the trouble to exert the powers of the glorious mechanism with which they are charged. They slouch, or dawdle, along in a listless lazy manner. Instinct tells us, and tells us rightly, to beware how we trust such persons with the conduct of our affairs, or with any office of responsibility. We feel that the lack of energy manifested in the guidance of their limbs is, too probably, a feature of character, which unfits them for the active duties of life; and we know that such men are not usually successful in their calling. _Thirdly_, there are those who shew, by the firmness and precision of their step, and by the regularity in the succession of the movements by which the step is made, that they are conscious of the dignity of their species, of the responsibility attendant on that dignity, and of the respect due to themselves. Such men we feel are likely to pursue their avocations energetically and methodically, as well as with punctuality.
Many points of character peep out in the way men walk. Our poet tells us that in one we may read
“rascal in the motions of his back And scoundrel in his supple sliding knee.”
Another has a halting, shuffling, undecided gait; while a third walks in a bold, determined, straight-forward, erect and independent manner. One has a cautious, parsimonious step, as if sparing of shoe-leather, or afraid to trust the ground; he has, however, probably, trusted the funds with considerable investments. Some walk with long, pretentious, measured strides; others make short, quick, insignificant steps. Some, again, are hurried, fussy, noisy; while others glide along in a quiet, shrinking, unpretending, it may be timid, manner.
I need not dilate upon these diversities. Your own observation will supply abundant illustrations of the correspondence between character and manner of walking.
The several movements in walking are under the control of the WILL, and are directed by it, to such an extent that the continuous agency of the will is essential to the process. If the influence of the will be suspended, but for a moment, the action ceases, and the man falls to the ground. Nevertheless, the play of the individual muscles, and their co-ordination, or the manner in which their several movements are combined, are, in a great measure, independent of the will. They are, to a certain extent, automatic, and result from peculiar relations between the nervous and the muscular systems. The will may be compared to the driver of an engine, who, by turning on the steam, and maintaining the supply, sets the machine in motion, and regulates the rate of its speed; but the several wheels are so arranged that they go on irrespectively of his immediate superintendence. It would be impossible for the engine-man to attend to the working of each detail of his machine; and it would be too much for the will to have to direct all the movements of the limbs in walking. We should be wearied with such an effort of attention before we had walked across a room; for the exercise of the will is exhausting, and soon engenders fatigue. The more we think of any movement and take pains to direct it, the sooner we are tired and unable to continue it; and the more the attention is diverted, the less quickly do we experience a feeling of exhaustion; while those movements in the body which are not at all under the influence of the will--the movements of the heart for instance--go on unceasingly, through a long life, without any sense of weariness. What so prevents fatigue, when we are walking, as the diverting conversation of an agreeable companion?
But though the combination of the movements in walking is, to a certain extent, automatic, it is not complete without the proper control of the will. This is proved by the gait of those unfortunate beings in whom the mind, and with it commonly the will, is deficient from birth--I mean IDIOTS. Their movements are, usually, more or less, irregular and unharmonious, jerky, without proper steadiness and rhythm; the head is tossed about; the eye looks one way; the fingers are sprawled out in another direction; the foot is jerked out at a hazard, as it were, so that you don’t know when it will reach the ground, perhaps it kicks against the other foot. A sad spectacle this. The visit to an Idiot Asylum fills one, it is true, with a sense of the value of an institution where these poor members of the human family are kept out of harm’s way, and away from the gibes of the village boys, and are made clean, and tidy, and taught so far as they are capable of instruction; but I know no sadder sight than is presented by a string of the inmates of such an asylum, guided from room to room by the foremost of the number, who shews by his walk, somewhat more steady than that of the others, that he is gifted with rather more intelligence than they, and is so fitted to be their guide.
An equally melancholy, an even more distressing, spectacle is that of criminals pacing, like animals in their dens, up and down the court-yard of their prison; for in them we know, that there is no deficiency of will. It is strong enough to control and regulate the movements of their limbs; but there is a still more important deficiency, viz. a deficiency of that moral sense which should control the will.
Another sad, but physiologically interesting, sight is the rolling walk of the drunkard. Here, again, the will is not deficient; but it is, partly, and by its own agency, dethroned. Enough of the will is left to set the machine going, not enough to guide it and control it well. Though the movements follow one another, for the most part, in proper sequence, they are uncertain and ill-directed. The balancing power is partly lost. The feet are dragged hither and thither, and thrown about, by the swerving weight of the body; and they follow one another upon the ground at uncertain intervals, and in any but a straight line. You watch a man in this state staggering from side to side, and wonder how he keeps his legs at all. Soon the foot catches against some slight obstacle or against the other leg, or fails to come quickly enough into the required place, and the man rolls over. The supple manner in which his unstrung limbs give under the weight, perhaps, saves him, to some extent, from the shock; but you must not imagine that drunkards have any charm against injury. A large proportion of the accidents admitted into our Hospitals are the result of drunkenness.
_Distinctive Features of the Human Foot._
I have already made a few comparisons between the human foot and that of certain of the lower animals. It will be interesting to add some others.
There are several animals, as the Monkey, the Bear, and some Reptiles, in which the foot resembles the human foot in many particulars. It has, for instance, the same number of toes as the human foot, and the same, or nearly the same, number of bones, and the latter disposed in much the same manner. Certain peculiarities, however, distinguish the human foot. These all have reference to the power which man, and man alone, possesses of standing firmly upright, and of walking steadily, upon the two feet.
The following are the most important of these distinctive features.
_First._ The several parts are fitted and bound together in a compact firm manner, so as to combine strength and elasticity in the highest degree. In this respect the human foot contrasts very remarkably with the sprawling foot of the Seal or Lizard (figs. 2 and 3, p. 11). The result is obtained, partly, by the great size of the tarsal bones, in proportion to the other components of the foot, and, partly, by the formation of the “Plantar Arch,” which is higher and stronger in man than in any of the lower animals.
_Secondly._ The TOES are short and small in relation to the other parts of the foot. In many animals, the Monkey for instance (fig. 44, p. 89), the toes form the greater part of the foot; and, in some, the bones of the instep are reduced in number as well as in size: the reason being that, in such animals, the toes are required to perform a variety of offices--burrowing in the ground, scratching, holding on to the branches of trees, catching and tearing prey, &c.--for which their services are not needed by man.
It may here be noticed that one of the great points of dissimilarity between the foot and the hand consists in the difference which the length of the digits bears to the other components in the two members. They form nearly _half_ the length of the hand, but not more than a _tenth_ of that of the foot. Clearly, therefore, they constitute a far less important segment of the lower limb than they do of the upper, and are intended to perform much less important functions in it. In the hand the fingers and thumb may be said to constitute the essential part; whereas the toes do little more than help the foot to adapt itself to inequalities of the ground and so to obtain a firmer holding. In civilized countries, accordingly, where we walk, chiefly, upon even paths and paved streets, very little evil results from the loss of the services of the toes which is incurred by covering over the foot to protect it against the hardness of the roads.
We often hear the toes spoken of as ill-treated members, which are not allowed fair play because the art of man keeps them in a state of inertness and deprives them of their natural functions. Anatomy, too, gives some countenance to the idea, inasmuch as it shews that the muscles which minister to the toes are as numerous as those which are concerned in moving the fingers; and we occasionally see persons, who, having been born without hands, or having lost them, contrive to write and paint and do other unusual offices with their toes. Watch the movements in an infant’s foot as yet unshod. They are considerably more free than in your own; especially you will observe that there is a power of separating the great toe from the others and approximating it to them which you have, probably, altogether lost. The small size, however, of the toes, and the comparative fixedness of the inner, or great toe, prove, that they were never intended for anything like the same variety of purposes as the fingers, and shew that, under the most favourable circumstances, the _pes_ could never be _altera manus_, as some would persuade us that it is. Certainly it was never intended to be an organ of prehension. Hence, although in practice, boot-makers may excite our wrath and deserve our condemnation, I don’t think that, in principle, they are so much to be complained of.
The _third_ striking peculiarity of the human foot is the size of the inner or GREAT TOE and the firm manner in which its metatarsal bone is joined to the other bones, so as to render it a main pillar of support to the foot. These features of the great toe have reference to the share of the weight of the body which is borne by the inner side of the foot, more particularly during the last stage of the step, when the body is propelled forwards over the other foot. Hence it is sometimes called the “hallux,” from a Greek word (ἅλ-λομαι) signifying to bound or spring. The _mobility_ of the _thumb_, enabling it to be opposed so easily to each of the other fingers, is a characteristic of the human _hand_; and the _solidity_ of the _great toe_ is equally, or even more, characteristic of the human _foot_. The great toe should be continued, from the instep, straight along the inner edge of the _foot_, or inclined a little _in_wards; often, as before mentioned, its phalanges become inclined _out_wards so as to interfere with the other toes[5].
[5] In ancient times warriors were wont to cut off the _great toes_ as well as the _thumbs_ of their captives to disable them for further service (Judges i. 6, 7).
Though, in many animals the number of the toes is the same as in man, this is not the case in all; and we may trace a gradual and progressive diminution of the number, in the following order.
[Illustration: Figs. 39. Elephant.
40. Hippopotamus.
41. Rhinoceros.
42. Ox.
43. Horse.]
I have said (page 10) that the inner toe is incomplete in all animals, forasmuch as, in none, does it possess the same complement of bones as do the other toes. You will not be surprised to find, therefore, that it is the first to be missing. The ELEPHANT goes upon _five_ toes; but if you look closely you will perceive that the inner toe (fig. 39, I.) has not attained even its usual incomplete number of bones. It is short of one; and the inner wedge-bone, which looks like a metacarpal bone, is prolonged, downwards, to supply the place, and to give sufficient length to the toe. The same thing may be seen in some other animals, and it is interesting as shewing the first indication of departure from what may be called the standard number of the phalanges. In the HIPPOPOTAMUS (fig. 40) we have an additional stage of imperfection in this same toe; for here there is only one small bone to remind us of the existence of the toe (it is the same in the Rhinoceros, I.); all the rest have failed to be developed; and the animal, consequently, goes upon _four_ toes. Next the failure appears on the _out_er side of the foot, and affects the little toe. Thus, the RHINOCEROS (fig. 41) goes upon _three_ toes--namely, Nos. II. III. and IV.--and there is scarcely a trace either of the first toe or of the fifth. In Ruminating animals, as the OX (fig. 42), the second toe is wanting, as well as the first and the fifth; so that the foot rests upon _two_ toes (Nos. III. and IV.); and in the HORSE (fig. 43), as we have already seen, only _one_ toe--the middle one (No. III.)--is developed sufficiently to reach the ground.
[Illustration: Fig. 44. Gorilla.]