In some very tall persons, and particularly in those who are so tall as to be called GIANTS, I have found the leg or shank bones, that is, the bones between the knee and the ankle, very long, disproportionately long to the rest of the skeleton. They are so in the skeleton of the Irish Giant, O’Byrne, which is preserved in the Museum of the College of Surgeons, in another Irish Giant in the Museum of Trinity College, Dublin, and in some other specimens which I have had an opportunity of measuring. In the name “Long Shanks” given to Edward I., the word “shanks” probably included the thigh as well as the leg, just as we are in the habit of applying the word “leg” to the whole of the lower limb. _Bones of the Foot._ [Illustration: Fig. 1.] There are 26 bones in the Foot. The hinder 7--called _tarsal_ bones--are short and thick; they form the hinder part of the instep. In front of them lie 5 _metatarsal_ bones, one passing, forwards, from the fore part of the tarsus to each toe. Behind, these are close together, and are connected with the tarsus. As they run forwards they diverge a little from one another; and their anterior ends rest upon the ground, and form the “balls” of the toes. They constitute the fore part of the instep. The remaining 14 bones are the toes. They are arranged in rows, like soldiers in a phalanx, three deep, and are hence called _phalanges_. You observe that, although each of the other toes has 3 bones, the great toe has only 2. In this respect, therefore, it is an imperfect, or, rather, an incomplete member. The deficiency does not depend upon a want of length in the great toe; for this is usually as long as the second toe; in some persons it is a good deal longer; and it is always distinctly longer than the outer two toes. The reason for there being only two phalanges instead of three probably is because the great toe is required to be stronger than any of the others; and an additional bone would have tended to weaken it. I have, elsewhere[1], given reasons for thinking that it is the middle phalanx which is absent in the great toe. [1] _Treatise on the Human Skeleton_, p. 395. [Illustration: Fig. 2. Seal’s Foot.] [Illustration: Fig. 3. Lizard’s Foot.]