DRESS AND CARE
OF
THE FEET;
SHOWING
THEIR NATURAL SHAPE AND CONSTRUCTION; THEIRUSUAL DISTORTED CONDITION; HOW CORNS, BUNIONS,FLAT FEET, AND OTHER DEFORMITIES ARE CAUSED,WITH INSTRUCTIONS FOR THEIR PREVENTIONOR CURE.
ALSO,
DIRECTIONS FOR DRESSING THE FEET WITH COMFORTAND ELEGANCE, AND MANY USEFUL HINTS TOTHOSE WHO WEAR, AS WELL AS THOSE WHOMAKE FOOT-COVERINGS.
ILLUSTRATED.
LONDON: WILLIAM TEGG.
1872.
[Pg iii]
PREFACE.
The object of this little treatise is to bring beforethe popular attention some ideas concerning thefeet that are not generally familiar; to exhibit the producingcauses of the common deformities and discomfortsto which they are subject; to show the bestmeans of preserving their natural shape and condition,or of restoring it as far as possible when lost; and tosuggest better methods for their dress and generaltreatment, in order to their more perfect health,beauty, and performance of function.
The subject has already received some little attention.Some time about the beginning of the present century[Pg iv]Dr. Peter Camper, of Amsterdam—a distinguishedman of his time—wrote a short dissertation upon the“Best Form of Shoe,” which was eventually translatedand published in England in 1861, in connection witha larger work by Mr. James Dowie. Dr. Camper’sessay was excellent as a first effort in this direction,furnishing some ideas upon the form of the foot andthe defect of its covering, which still remain hardlyless just and appropriate. Mr. Dowie added somegood suggestions, and faithfully exposed the faults ofthe foot-gear worn by the British army and the humblerclasses; but a considerable portion of his bookwas taken up in the explanation and advocacy ofelasticated leather—an article of his own invention—whilethe whole was written in a style too difficult tobe generally read.
Another work published in England was the “Bookof the Feet,” by J. Sparkes Hall, issued a few yearsprevious to that of Mr. Dowie. Though very interestingas a concise history of the shoemaking art, it[Pg v]touched but slightly upon those abuses of the feet withwhich shoemaking is connected.
But a late essay directly upon the subject, by Prof.Hermann Meyer, of Zurich, Switzerland, has a valuesuperior in this respect to that of all the precedingones.
The present writer has intended to include all theimportant ideas of previous writers on the subject,together with such information as could be gatheredfrom medical and other works, but going farther andadding such original notions as the observation andthought of his own mind could supply, with the purposeof making the whole as thorough and completeas possible, both from the point of view of the physiologistand that of the practical shoemaker.
The book is not written in the dignified sty