THE COLOUR OF THE EYES.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XVII, Issue XVIII, 31 October 1896, Page 566

THE COLOUR OF THE EYES.

Into the realm of sentiment, with heavy footfall, like a bull in a china shop or an elephant among porcelain, the sedate and matter-of-fact statistician obtrudes himself, intent on dealing, through percentages, with matters which one might think would be exempt from such prosaic consideration. The latest subjects of statistical inquiry are light and dark eyes, and as the result of sundry responses to questions propounded in various countries and duly authenticated, it has been discovered (and not merely discovered bnt also proved) that, taking the average of Europe and America, 44 6 is the percentage of men having light eyes, ineluding bine and gray. The proportion of girls and women having bine or gray eyes is by the same computation 34-2 per cent. In other words, blue eyes are decidedly rarer among women than among men, and it is for this reason, perhaps, that bine eyes, especially in combination with blonde hair, are esteemed so highly as a feature of feminine beanty. Men have light eyes of tener than women, but in the intermediate grade of colour between light and dark the percentage of the two sexes is very nearly, though not quite, the same. In this intermediate category are brown and hazel eyes, neither pure light nor genuine black. The percentage of these among men is 43 T and among women 45'1. The percentage of dark, or, more properly, black eyes, is larger among women, being 20 7 per cent, of the whole number, while among men it is 12 3. Perhaps it is the relative rarity of dark eyes among men wbich establishes the rnle that dark-eyed men are esteemed by women ttf be more fortunate in the colour of their eyes than bine-eyed men. The figures upon which these per centages are based are the result of inquiries not prosecuted in one or more of the countries of Europe or one or more States of the United States, for, as is well known, in sonthern European countries dark eyes both among men and women predominate, while light eyes are to be found in just as high a proportion in northern countries.