system 118

118

position or movement reprosented. Everything bears the jmpress uf perfect health and bcauty : deep chest, broad and rounded shoulders. slender hips, thc muscles of thc truuk (uli, and the limbs substantial at the root, bul growing gradually slenderer towards thc delicate wrists and insteps. It is from this company that you sliould seiect your model.

It is doiły physical exercise, if only for a short time that bas so excellent an clłect. It ought therefore to becomc a habit, a nećessity that a well-ordered houseiiokl can just as ill dispense with as warm dishes for dinner or a cloth on thc table. Daily exercise can by no means be replaccd by, for example. one hours gymnustics twice a wcek, or somc hours' practice at games or sports in thc week end. Koweeer exccllcnt the latter may be, regarded as supplcmcntary.

Fifteen minutes everv morning only come altogether to one and tliree quarter hours in the week ; how can it be, then. that its effcct on the human tramę is so much greater and better ? The reason is, you >ee, that during an hour s gymnastics in company a grcat deal of time is spent in chailging one’s clothes, in words of command. pauses. and in watching others ; in addition to which it is almost intariahly the casc that many of the exercises have comparatnely little direct influence upoti the health These seven short intercals of fifteen minutes, on the contrary, are. froni the first second to the last, filled with liard Work for the most vital organs. 1-raally. the body can only " digest ” with adrantage a certain amount of exercise at one time : if it gets too much in one dose, the resnlt may be morę hamiful than beneficial.

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When, with such thoughts in my mind, 1 turn to physical exercises as they are taught in schools, it scems to me that these latter are anything hut adequate. In my opinion, the instruction in this branch should assist the health and physical deeelopment, not only during school years, but later in life as well.

Tn most other subjects reading, writing, and arithmetic, for mstance thc pupil acquires lcnowledge of which fie can make daily use in after-lifc. The physical instruction, on the other band, reqnires rooms and apparatus which are not readily or dailv accessihle to him after ho lias left school.

In reaFty, there exist only two main forms of rational physical cducation for the young : and each of these forms is supplementary to the other. E\ercise in open-air sports and games constitutes the first of these methods, by which the physical and. to a high degree, the morał cotiditions of the young are simultaneously improved. The ideał, physically deecloped man must be, so to speak, a supple-limbed, agile being, whose chief characteristics are actieity and powcr of endurance ; and these attributes are best attained through the medium of athletic* and games, a method, to be surę, not calculated to produce that pon-derous muscularity as artificially deeeloped by cxercises performed with heavv weights and with earious kinds of gymnastic apparatus. But such a condition is not evon worth the striring for, for where practical iife is concerned. such can only be regarded as a dead burden, unwieldy. superfluous, troublesome, and probably unhealthy Morcoeer, atliletics and games have the further adeantage of being, at the present day. the only means of encouraging in youth sucii mental qualities and attributes of character as courage. resolution, presence of mind, sense of honour feeling of good fellowship, and readiness to assist the weak.