The child's book of nature for the use of families and schools : intended to aid mothers and teachers in training children in the observation of nature . room for theblow to get at the eye; and evenif it does, the wrinked skin of thelids makes a cushion over it thatbreaks the force of the blow. Youcan see that the blow would bemuch more apt to do harm if thewinking muscle merely brought the lids together. As it is, ablow commonly hits on the eyebrow or cheek, or both, while theeye is safe, shut up and pushed back in its cavern upon itscushion of fat. To see how much the bringing together of th
The child's book of nature for the use of families and schools : intended to aid mothers and teachers in training children in the observation of nature . room for theblow to get at the eye; and evenif it does, the wrinked skin of thelids makes a cushion over it thatbreaks the force of the blow. Youcan see that the blow would bemuch more apt to do harm if thewinking muscle merely brought the lids together. As it is, ablow commonly hits on the eyebrow or cheek, or both, while theeye is safe, shut up and pushed back in its cavern upon itscushion of fat. To see how much the bringing together of thecheek and eyebrow defends the eye, you must look at some oneas he forcibly closes the eye, as represented in the figure. Andif, at the same time, you put your finger on the parts, you willsee how the cushions which all this wrinkling makes over theeye and about its socket defend it from harm. So you see that not only is the eye guarded by parapets ofbone, but the busy winking muscle raises up cushions on themwhenever the eye sees a blow coming. These cushions oftensave the bone from being cracked, and in this way also keepthe eye from being HOW THE EYE IS GUARDED. 57 The eyebrows. The eyelashes. How the tears defend the eye. Of what use do you think the hairs on the eyebrows are?They are for good looks, you will say. But they are for some-thing more than this; they are a defence to the eye. How thisis I will explain to yon. You know what the eaves of a houseare for when there is no trough to the roof; they keep the rainfrom running down from the roof on the sides of the make it drop off to the ground a little way from the so the hairy eyebrows make the sweat of the forehead dropoff upon the cheek, instead of running down into the eye. Theeyebrows, then, are the eaves of the roof of the eyes house. Perhaps you will ask what hurt the sweat would do if it shouldrun down into the eye. It would be very disagreeable; and,besides this, it would irritate t
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Keywords: ., bookauthorho, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectscience
