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MY BREATHING SYSTEM

But I have never seen what I cali " my ordinary complete breath ” explained before. This is the morę remarkable sińce it is the most natural and easy way of changing the largest possible amount of air in the lungs. And that is just what the practical sportsman, athlete, or working man reąuires to attain by respiration. The reason may be that all the above-mentioned booklets have been written either by indoor studcnts of theoretical science, for whom shallow breathing has always sufficed (as distinguished from the case of the j-mile runner when the winning-post has just been passed) ; or by athletic authors who lack the amount of education and study necessary for describing just what goes on in the interior of the body. Most of such authors advocate only one of the various forms of breathing, simul-taneously condemning all the others.

The Hindu-Yogi Breathing.

Only twice have I seen advocated a combination of the three main forms of breathing. Let me first mention the " Yogi complete breath," as described in the Hindu-Yogi philosophical books. This is far morę complicated and difficult to perform than my complete breath. In the Yogi complete breath the student is instructed first to fili the lower lobes of the lungs, pushing the abdomen forwards, then successively to push out the ribs, first the lower and then the upper ones, afterwards to protrude the upper chest and, finally, again to draw the lower part of the abdomen inwards. The exhalation is performed firstly by drawing the abdomen still farther inwards and lifting it upwards, the chest being fixcd duting the exhalation and not relaxed until the air is entirely exhaled, when. finally, also the abdomen is relaxed. What an amount of supcrfluous work for the brain and straining of muscles! And the Yogis cali it the only natural method of breathing 1 Both the inhalation and the

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