WHY WE ARE RIGHT-HANDED.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLVI, Issue XLVI, 30 May 1914, Page 12

WHY WE ARE RIGHT-HANDED.

A hard blow, well directed on the left breast, will easily kill, or at any rate stun, even a. strong man. Hence, from an early period men have used the right hand to fight with, and have employed the left arm to chiefly cover the heart and to parry a blow aimed at that specially "vulnerable region. And when weapons of offence and defence supersede the fistsj it is the right hand that grasps the 6pear or sword, while the left "holds over the heart, for defence, the shield or buckler.

From this simple origin, then, the whole vast difference of right and left! in civilised life takes its beginning. At first, no doubt, the superiority of the right hand was only in the manner of fifjhtinfr. But that alone gave it a distinct advantiage, and paved the way at least for the supremacy elsewhere.