OCR Text |
Show 204 r CIIAP. XI. . 8ITRUOGTNG TJIR SHOUJ~DERS. 265 arms wore placed, I was not at all aware that my ~yc· brows ":ere raised ancl month op ned, until I loo1,.. d at 1nyself 1n a O'lass ; and sin · then I have notic cl the same move1n 'nts in tho fa . f oth r . In the ccoinpanying Plate VI., figs. 3 and 4, Mr. R jland r has su - cessfully acted the gc ture of shrugging tho houlder . Englishmen arc 1nuch l s d mon trative than th me~ of most other European nati ns, and th y shrug then shoulders far less frequ ntly and energetically than ~Frenchmen or Italians do. 'rhe gesture vari .s in all degrees fron1 tho complex movement, just d scrib cl, to only a momentary and scarcely perc ptible raising of both shoulders; or, as I have noticed in a lacly sitting in nn arm-chair, to the more turning slightly outwards of the open hands with soparat d fingers. I hav never seen very young English children shrug their should rs, but the following case was observed with are by a medical professor and excellent observer, and has been communicated to n1e by him. The father f this gentleman was a Parisian, and his rnother a Scotch lady. fljs wife is of British extraction on both sides, and n1y informant does not believe that she ever shruggeu lwr .shoulders in her lifo. His children have been r •ared in England, and the nursen1aid is a thorough Engli hwoman, who has never been seen to shrug her should rR. Now, his eldest daughter was observed to shrug her shoulders at the age of between sixteen and eighteen n1onths; her mother exclaiming at the time, "Look at " the little French girl shrugging her shoulders!" At 1 first she often acted thus, sometimes throwing her head a little backwards and on one side, but shA did not, as far as was observed, n1ove her elbows and hands in tho usual manner. The habit gradually wore away, and .now, when she is a little over four years old, she is never seen to act thns. rrho father is told that he sometimPs |