Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Our feet and their coverings. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.
7/8 page 7
![persons, the restoration of freedom to the toes is attended by superior power of action in the foot and leg, and increased facility of pro- gression. The ordinary method by which the shoemaker relieves the pain caused by the pressure of the shoe upon the projection of the metatarso-phalangeal articulation, produced by the habitual forcing of the point of the great-toe towards the middle line of the foot, is to give more room in the upjier-leathcr at this s]iot. This expedient may afford a temporary palliative, but eventually only adds to the misery of the patient, by aiding to increase the obliquity of the great- toe. The sole real and permanent cure for bunions and corns, as well pointed out many years ago by Sir E. Brodie, is to restore the normal position of the toes. This may be a work of time, but with patience and care it may generally be accomplished. But if we ourselves have suffered from the ignorance and blind ad- herence to custom of those who had the control over our feet in our infancy, there is no reason why we should transmit the same fate to a future generation. The members of our own profession, to whom the world is so much indebted for the dissemination of correct information upon many questions connected with the sanitary management of in- fants, should, by their advice and encouragement, and especially by example in their own families, give an extended impetus to the move- ment inaugurated in these works. We are persuaded from actual ex- perience that if such a movement became general, a vast increase in the health and happiness of our children would be the necessary con- sequence. The drawing of an outline of the sole of the foot of a grown-up person, relied upon by many shoemakers as the most exact method of obtaining the required form for the shoe, in many cases does more harm than good, as it assists to perpetuate, instead of correct, the already existing deformities; but with a child this plan will give a perfect representation of what is required. A comparison of the out- line of such a drawing, and of that of the sole of the shoe usually sold for the same foot, will furnish a serious matter for reflection. We quite agree with Dr. Humphry in his protest against the com- mon notion of supporting and strengthening the ankles by tight- laced boots, which, as he says— Has its parallel in the idea of strengthening the waist by stays. The notion is, in botii instances, fortified by the fact that those persons who have been accustomed to the pressure, cither upon the ankle or the waist, feel a want of it when it is removed, and are unconifojtablc without it. They forget, or are unconscious, that the feeling of the want has boon cngcudcrca by the appliance, and that had they never resorted to the latter, they would never have experienced the former. There can bo no surer way of producing permanently weak ankles, than by lacing them up tightly during childhood, and so preventing the natural development of their ligament.?. A few words may be useful, in conclusion, upon the character and contents of the works above x-eferred to. ' Why the Shoe Pinches,' is the English title of a wcU-illustrated](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b22283274_0007.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
