Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 8, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 12 November 1874 — Facial Asymmetry. [ARTICLE]

Facial Asymmetry.

A writer in the Popular Science Monthly says; “There are many other facial anomalies which fail to attract attention because we have grown accustomed to them. We should expect the convex cast of one side of the face to fit, line for line, into the concave cast of the other; but it is doubtful it there is to be anywhere found one single head of this ideal perfection. Neither the contour of, the efieeks nor the lines of the counte-nance-are the same on both sides, and they are all the less so because every one unconsciously tends to perform many* unilaterial facial movements, which in time cause a divergence between the two sides of the face. Besides, the head, projecting &h it does freely into air, is more dependent than we imagine on wind and weather. Suppose a person were to sit constantly at a window, turning one side to the cooler atmosphere out of doors and the other toward a hot stove —the result would be a twofold growth of the facial muscles. One side of the face might become rounded, the other flat or concave; and, though such faces are not unfrequent, we do not notice the anomaly simply because we are accustomed to -it. In the Lapp we havea good illustration of this unequal development. Just as the trees of liis native land are stunted, so too his features become monstrous, irregu’ar and one-sided; the frontal bones are forced, as though by spasm, down on the maxillaries, producing the most singular combinations and contortions of the features. A not uncommon form of asymmetry, in more favored lands, is the presence of a dim-ple-on one cheek, while the other has no such indentation, or but a faint one. In such cases the face has, as it were, a summer and a winter side, just like the apple, which is round and ruddy on its summer side, but on the shade-side flattened and wan.”

Laura Berry recently fell fainting in the school-room at Carson, Nev. There was nothing mysterious in the origin of her swoon; the only wonder was that she recovered from it. She had within three weeks committed to memory 300 pages of history and 200 of natural philosophy. The night before she and a class-mate had not gone to bed.,at all, but studied throughout the night and until nine that morning. Her guardians, it is unnecessary to state, never fainted away over books. When a man milks a cow he should not attempt to smoke a cigar or an old stinking pipe at the same time. A young man in the country tried it' and got along until he lowered his head and touched the cow’s.flank with the lighted end of his cigar. The next instant himself and cigar were dreadfully put out. The cow introduced about two tons of weight into one of her hind legs, and then passed it under the milker’s left jaw, and thus served him right. An Oil City (Pa.) woman’s hair instantlju.turned' gray the •other day when she was left by a departing train. Upon inquiry it turned. put she had left her new bonnet on board and just stopped off a moment to say “good-by” to a friend. . „ ,