Height

“ Or if it be only meant that we think of a particular height, which must be a precise, positive, determinate idea, even this supposition may in the same way be shewn to be exceedingly fallacious, and an inversion of the natural order of our ideas. For take any given height of a man, whether tall, short, or middle-sized, and let that height be as visible as you please, yet the actual height to which it amounts must be made up of the length of the different parts, the head, the face, the neck, the body, limbs, &c. ”

“ Remember that our own tallest and noblest trees in England do not attain more than 100 feet or so in height; then try to imagine those having four times that height and stems or trunks proportionately huge. It is like comparing our five-storey buildings with the forty-storey buildings of New York, eight times their altitude. ”

“ Whether the height on which we stand, be elevated only a few feet, or have beneath it a precipitous abyss of a thousand fathoms, our footing, if all other circumstances be the same, is in itself equally sure. ”

“ I see, but cannot reach, the height
That lies forever in the light,
And yet forever and forever,
When seeming just within my grasp,
I feel my feeble hands unclasp,
And sink discouraged into night! ”

“ Almost everything seemed to be horizontal, but such things as stood perpendicular in this flat world gained a gigantic height. The two human beings looked at each other in amazement that such a tall man and woman existed. ”

“ The height of the stature is taken without the shoes, and it is necessary to state at what hour of the day the measurement is made, because in the morning we are taller (though by only a few millimetres) than we are in the evening. ”

“ Everyone seems to over-estimate the proper height.
Another favourite illusion is to ask a person to mark on the wall a height from the floor which would represent the length of a horse’s head: here the majority guess far too little—for a horse’s head is much longer than most people imagine, ranging from 25 to 34 inches. In a recent experiment 5 persons out of 6 under-estimated the proper height. ”

“ Then work with longer lengths out of doors with several feet, and several yards. Fences, roads, streets, dooryards, houses, all can be judged as to length.
Height is less easy to estimate for we are not so accustomed to looking up and down as we are to looking [473] forward or back and forth, but the same rules hold good. Learn to know the height of a chair seat, a table, your own height, a room, a house, trees: by measuring and looking, and looking and measuring, you will accomplish much.
To learn to judge weight begin by holding in your hand something that weighs a pound ”

“ Suppose a million of the men to stand in turns with their backs against a vertical board of sufficient height, and their heights to be dotted off upon it. The line of average height is that which divides the dots into two equal parts, and stands, in the case we have assumed, at the height of sixty-six inches. ”

“ Seven, eight, and nine hundred feet have been stated as the height by different writers, and some have even fancied that the height might be ascertained from the pulsations which the water makes in its descent. ”

“ The natural height of mankind seems to be about five feet, and the deviations from that standard scarcely exceed a foot, so that a man of six feet is considered as very tall, and a man of four as very short. ”

“ The mind, from home association, supposes them to be of the same height as average English trees on a hill-top—say fifty feet—and estimates, rapidly and unconsciously, the height of the mountain by that standard. ”

“ THE STRUGGLE ON THE HEIGHT
In all great mountain ranges there are what might be called heights of man and heights of nature. There are always hills that seem to invite the puny human agility: that hold at their summits resting-places whence men may obtain their “view” and begin their descent again, filled with pride at the conquest of inconsequent difficulties. ”

“ From all this we may conclude, that there may have possibly been seen some solitary instances of men who were ten feet in height; that those of eight feet are extremely uncommon, and that even six feet and a half far exceeds the height of men in Europe. ”

“ Why, the height of a man, in nine cases out of ten, can be told from the length of his stride. It is a simple calculation enough, though there is no use my boring you with figures. I had this fellow's stride both on the clay outside and on the dust within. Then I had a way of checking my calculation. When a man writes on the wall, his instinct leads him to write about the level of his own eyes. Now that writing was just over six feet from the ground. ”

“ In height, although very much above the average—some, indeed, reaching the height of 6 feet 4 inches, and all being broad and muscular—they have been greatly exaggerated, for, being very long in the body, they seem to tower above the European while sitting on horseback. ”

“ It is not the element of height alone which gives mountains their significance. There are many other features, which are little studied, yet of real import. It is, however, not a matter of indifference whether a chain thrusts up its peaks 1000, 5000, 10,000, or 20,000 feet, and the height has been made and will continue to be made a subject of careful investigation. In reference to height, we distinguish what, in a general sense, we call mountains, [3] into hills, mounts, and mountains of various degrees of magnitude. ”

“ If this is done accurately, the height to which the new line reaches will measure the size of the figure first drawn; for the taller the figure is, the steeper the hill will be; the longer the figure, the longer the hill; either cause makes both the size of the figure and the height of the hill greater, and in the same proportion; so the one is a measure of the other, and so, moreover, is the height of the hill, which can be measured by scale, a measure of the quantity of electricity that has passed. ”

“ Every part is so perfect in proportion and finish that, as has been often remarked, it is only realized by comparison with the height of the human figures moving about on its paved floor. Perhaps there is also an architectural reason which in a large degree accounts for this difference between apparent and actual height. ”

“ A giant eight feet high, seen at the distance of twenty-four feet, would not appear taller than a child two feet in height, at the distance of six feet; for both would be seen nearly under the same angle. ”

“ One cannot reason, then, from differences of height to sustain the multiplicity of human species.
There is another consideration not less important:
From all the data I can gather, it results that the mean stature of men, the world over, is about 5 feet 3 inches. But this mean, like that given above, results from very numerous and very diverse heights. If in thought we place all men in one line according to their height, it is easy to see that we should obtain a series in which the difference from one to the next will not be, perhaps, the 1⁄2500 of an inch. ”

“ If they are higher, the heights of the architraves are to be worked out proportionately in the same manner from the height of the columns.
9. For the higher that the eye has to climb, the less easily can it make its way through the thicker and thicker mass of air. So it fails when the height is great, its strength is sucked out of it, and it conveys to the mind only a confused estimate of the dimensions. ”

“ Before their eyes in sudden view appear The secrets of the hoary Deep—a dark Illimitable ocean, without bound, Without dimension; where length, breadth, and height, And time, and place, are lost; ”

“ Here it is seen that the mean man is a little under 5 ft. 8 in. in height, the numbers of men shorter and taller diminishing with evident regularity, down to the few representatives of the very short men of 5 ft. and under, and the very tall men of 6 ft. 4 in. and over. The law of relation of height to numerical strength is shown graphically by the binomial curve figured above, where the abscissæ (measured from an origin on the left) represent the heights of the men, and the ordinates the relative numbers of men corresponding to each height. ”

“ That is tall whose height is greatly in excess of its breadth or diameter, and whose actual height is great for an object of its kind; as, a tall tree; a tall man; tall grass. That is lofty which is imposing or majestic in height; we term a spire tall with reference to its altitude, or lofty with reference to its majestic appearance. That is elevated which is raised somewhat above its surroundings; that is eminent which is far above them ”

“ In like manner, of fifty young persons of the average of fourteen years and eleven months, the measurement in height was four feet five inches, and in circumference two feet three inches; while of forty-nine young persons employed on farms, of the average of fifteen years and six months, the measurement in height was four feet ten inches and eight-elevenths, and, in circumference, two feet three inches, being a difference of nearly six inches in height in favour of the agricultural labourers. ”

“ Examples may be found elsewhere of several individuals seven feet in height, below which, after the opinion of the ancients, we may cease to consider men gigantic. Entire families sometimes, though rarely, occur of six feet four, or six feet six inches high. ”

“ A good many are from two hundred to two hundred and twenty feet in height, with a diameter at four feet from the ground of six to eight feet, and occasionally a grand patriarch, seven or eight hundred years old, is found that is ten or even twelve feet in diameter and two hundred and forty feet high, with a magnificent crown seventy feet wide. ”

“ The men were remarkably short and slenderly built in proportion; the tallest we measured was 5 feet 9 inches, the shortest 5 feet 2 inches; the average height seemed to be about 5 feet 6 inches. What their absolute colour is, is difficult to say, they were so completely covered with dirt, which seemed to have stuck to their hides from the day of their birth, without their once having attempted to remove it. ”

“ And further, as the foot is one sixth of a man's height, the height of the body as expressed in number of feet being limited to six, they held that this was the perfect number, and observed that the cubit consisted of six palms or of twenty-four fingers. ”

“ If any personal description of me is thought desirable, it may be said, I am in height, six feet, four inches, nearly; lean in flesh, weighing, on an average, one hundred and eighty pounds; dark complexion, with coarse black hair, and gray eyes. ”

“ In other words, it is of fundamental importance to determine the reciprocal relation, in the stature, between the bust and the lower limbs, that is, between the height of the bust and the total height of the body. ”

“ The obvious of the past garish and sunny hour, when their modest measurement proclaimed itself to any reasonably experienced eye, has vanished, and you find yourself confronted by heights that lack absolutely nothing in stature and dignity, and are in effect mountains of 10,000 feet. ”

“ It is not money, it is not even brains—though no doubt yours are excellent. It is not your six feet of height, though I should have rather liked to be a couple of inches taller. It’s a sort of air you have of being thoroughly at home in the world. ”

“ One has to have instruments with which to calculate the height of mountains, and I couldn't do it even if I had the instruments, but I should say from what I've heard about the country and the tales of explorers that the peak we're looking at is about 14,000 feet high. ”

“ In such cases as heights of men or skull measurements, where great numbers of specimens exist, the average will be actually presented by many of them; but if we take a small group, such as the measurements of a college class, it may happen that the average height (say, 5 ft. 8 in.) is not the actual height of any one man. ”

“ The whole cause of the elevation of a weight of ten pounds a foot high cannot be also the whole cause of the elevation of twenty pounds to the same height, for the simple reason that in the latter case the elevation of ten pounds—of half the weight—would be an event which had no cause at all. ”

“ But if a man who had been making his best efforts in jumping, cleared only a height of four feet, and presently being told to jump over an eight-feet wall, cleared that height with apparent ease, we should be disposed to regard the feat as savouring of the miraculous. ”

“ Stature.—Among all the measurements relating to the form, the principal one is the stature. It has certain characteristics that are essentially human. What we understand by stature is the height of a living animal, when standing on its feet. Let us compare the stature of one of the higher mammals, a dog for instance, with that of man. The stature of the dog is determined essentially by the length of its legs, while the spinal column is supported in a horizontal position by the legs themselves. ”

“ It is seldom that one has an opportunity of looking down a perpendicular height of fourteen hundred feet: and I stood enjoying the sensation for much longer than I believe my guide judged à propos, for he seemed scarcely to know whether he ought to let me stand there or not. ”

“ "There is a steep and lofty wall,
Where my warders trembling stand,
He who at speed shall ride round its height,
For him shall be my hand." ”