Evening star., 1901-05-25

less some unforeseen occurrence prevents
may be encouraging intermarriage between
giants for many centuries But to increase
humanity to the proportions OF Adam
would be neither economic nor convenient.
If built according to the scale of proper
tionS which prCSCribeS the average man or
modern times, he must have weighed some
thing like 10000 pounds, and must have re-
qured 40 times as much food as a normal
individual of today. Thus ham sandwich
sufficient to crafty his voraCious nOon-day
appetite would cost him $2,2t@ and reason
able slice of pie or cup of coffee the same.
His minimum for a quick lunch would be
$6.GDo He would wear 3lS-inch collar,
and the seams of his trousers would meas
ure sixty feet. A SkyScraper taller than
the Eifel Tower and wide as the Capt.
tol at Washington would be a moderately
small house for him to occupy. In other
words there would have to be vast eX-
pansiOn in currency to maintain such
race. which would over-populate the earth
to such a degree that vast multitudes
would have to be killed off every year.
Unless domestic animals and vegetables
We're enlarged in proportion their eXtinc-
tinn would result within year.
Man continued to deterorate in stature
from the time of Adam according to Bib
lical data Thus Noah a STRIPPING Of
only twcnty-seven feet. Abraham twenty
feet, Moses thirty feet. These estimates
We're made by Henriott. member of the
French Academy. Goliath was six cubits
and one span. or nine feet nine inches tall.
steadily declined until the dawn of the
Christian era. and that it would have con-
tinued had it not been for the coming Of
Jesus.
Our Descendants VIII BE Giants.
But that average man is taller today than
he ever was before and that the standard
of his stature is gradually increasing is
the opinion of Prof w. J. McGee, the
well-knOwn ethnologist. expressed to me
yesterday. MANS stature will continue
to increase slowly said he I'VE are
taller than our early ancestors because we
are better nourished, are more regular in
our habits, more rational in eXer-
else. Yet | can see no reason for a rapid
increase in the stature of future genera
tions. for any erratic development. any
conflict with the general advance of the
race other than, to some extent, the eimi-
nation of the abnormal Ggantism is as
abnormal as pigmyism The chance of
the worlds knowing of pigmies or giants
today is fully 100 times greater than 1t
was century ago. If there is a giant
anywhere in the world today we know
about it In other words. while the aver
age stature of man has continued to in
crease. the tendency of the race to produce
men abnormally tall or abnormally short
has decreased. The tendency toward main
tanning an average ana eliminating abnOr-
mails is ore of the strongest forces in hu-
manity. That opposites attract is one of
natures laws. With improved means of
transportation man has 100 times better
opportunity for mating he pleases now
than he had century ago Hence this
attraction of Oppostes brings more men
and women of tall and small stature to-
gether The result, of course. is the Gre
alton of less giants, less dwarfs. more peo-
pile near the average height. Yet I repeat
this average is increasing steadily while
the extremes are growing closer and closer
together.
JOHN ELFRETH WATKINS, Jr.