KNOCK-OUT BLOWS.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1245, 26 February 1914, Page 29

KNOCK-OUT BLOWS.

MOST VULNERABLE PLACES. A writer in the London “Times” discusses the various kinds of knockout blows, and draws morals from the Carpentier-Wells fight. Of the blow on the jaw he says:—“Apart from courage, men vary in their sensitiveness to this type of knock-out blow. The apparatus affected is situated just above where the lower jaw hinges on to the head, and the thickness of the bony plate between the jawbone and the internal ear is not the same in all cases; nor is the exact relationship between the jaw and the base of the soul.” “SOUL OF MAN IN HIS STOMACH.” As for knock-out blows on the body, the writer says:—“The heart may be stepped or slowed, and the blood vessels diluted owing to the slackening of the walls, if certain nerves are stimulated. These nerves are most readily excited by blows in certain places—for instance, the neck and ‘the mark’ as boxers call the portion of the stomach just below the breastbone (though the whole of the latter region is more or less, vulnerable). The alchemist Van Helmont placed the soul of man in his stomach, not for the obvious reason, but because he was apt to lose consciousness If hit there, and he would doubtless have regarded the downfall of Wells as a proof of his theory. . . . .It is not merely that breath is knocked out of the body; one breathes to re-aerate one’s blood, land in these circumstances the flow of blood through the lungs is greatly diminished, as well as the flow through the brain, and a brain which is not supplied with blood cannot keep the muscles taut. WELL-ARMORED CARPENTIER. There is a very great variation among individuals in the re-actions to blows in these regions. Some people are affected by a degree of violence which leaves others unscathed, and that this difference is physical as well as moral can be proved by feeling the pulse and observing whether the face turns pale. Negroes are much more vulnerable to blows cutting off the brain’s blood supply than to attacks on the jawbone. A professional prize-fighter does h’s best to develop his neck and body to protect the nerves in these regions, but apart from the actual sensitiveness of the

nerves a thin neck and a long thin stomach do not afford a good foundation whereon to build. To see Wells and Carpentier in the ring suggested a liner and a battleship.”