MEN AND WOMENS’ PHYSICAL STRENGTH.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 3652, 12 October 1912, Page 4

MEN AND WOMENS’ PHYSICAL STRENGTH.

“Woman is no longer the weaker, but tho stronger sex.” That is tho startling assertion which a French professor, M. Carvallo, has been"making at the Congress of the Society for the Advancement of Science, now' sitting at Nina es.

Professor Carvallo claimed for the female of the human species what scientists claim for tho female oyster. “Far-seeing Nature,” ho said, “is seeking to re-establish a sex equilibrium, and that is why the percentage of female births is increasing. A LADY DOCTOR’S VIEWS.

Let us now' sec what an Englishwoman, Dr. Jane Walker, of Harley Street, has to say on the subject. “In one way,” she said to a “Pall Mall Gazette” representative, “Professor Carvallo is right, though he should not have adduced tho oyster theory in support of his assertion. “When one considers the amount of clothing which a woman wears and compares it with that of the man about town, it is impossible not to conclude that she is the stronger of the two.

“Again, take the sportswoman, and we find her playing tennis, golf, hockey, and even cricket without putting her stays aside. What sportsman would play any of those games with anything on but light flannels. “In mv experience, also, women bear illness much better than men, and are, in a sense, mors plucky. “This is, uo doubt, due to the fact that when a man falls ill 'he has already wasted all his powers of resistance in the stuffy atmosphere of the workshop, the office, or the club. Women’s resisting powers have not been so impaired. “That is why, for instance, one constantly hears of men dying of pneumonia, but seldom of women suecumb-

‘'Nervous men are also more difficult than nervoug women to get well. “But,” she added, “I do not think: that women can stand the strain of the daily struggle for life as well as men.

“There are many men, for instance, who are able to work eighteen hours a day at a stretch, tut hardly a woman could be found to stand the strain for such long hours.

“As for night work, she simply could not do it, at any rate, for any length of time. “In my opinion, however, the question as to the relative strength of men and women is not one of sex but of individuals. “Take the domestic father and mother, for instance. We see them both going to their work in the morning, and returning home in the after non or evening.

“They have both done a good day’s work, but, while the domestic father sits down, enjoys his pipe, and generaly yawns, saying he feels tired, the domestic mother lias still something to do in the household. She never says, ‘l’m so tired.’ “This simply proves that she ia able to do more work without being fatigued than can her husband.

FAMINE AND BOYS.

“The increase of female births,” said Dr. Jane Walker, “is due to the fact that women are better fed nowadays than in days gone by, and under* fed women always give birth to boys. “Note, for instance, tb-r- number of boys horn during the Irish famine of • 847. “In a few months’ time we shall also see that the number of male birth<i in the East End has increased, owing to the dock strike.

“But men,’’ she concluded, “must be on the look-out, as women are growing taller and are better fed.”