MAN GETTING SMALLER.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 2549, 1 March 1923, Page 4

MAN GETTING SMALLER.

FROM GIANTS TO DWARFS. A French statistician lias been studying the average heights of men at different periods of the world’s history and has reached some alarming conclusions. The recorded facts extend over nearly three centuries. It is found that in 1610 the average height of men in Europe was nearlv sft. (Jin. In 1790 it was sft. (Jin. In 1820 it was sft. sin. and a fraction. At the present time it is sft. sif in. It is easy to deduce from these figures a rate of regular and gradual decline in human stature. By this _ caleutation it is determined that the stature of the first men attained the surprising average of 16ft. 9in. /

The race had already deteriorated in the days of Og and Goliath was quite a degenerate offspring of the giants. Coming down to later time, we find that at the beginning of our era the average height of man was 9ft., and in the time of Charlemagne it was Bft. Bin. But the most astonishing result of this man study comes from the application of the same law of diminution. It is conclusively shown that in 4000 A.D. the height of the average man will be but 15 inches, and in a few thousand years more the end of the world will come for men will get so short that there will be nothing left of them.