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MY BREATHING SYSTEM

would die. But few understand how to brcathe, inhale and exhale, corrcctly.

Is “ Natural ” Breathing always Correct Breathing?

I have often read in books on " Breathing " that babics and animals breathe correctiy. There may be some reason in using the term “ correctiy,” because it is natural for unintelligent creatures to breathe in such a manner, but a baby’s breathing is very short and superficial, even when lying still, consisting of 42 to 45 respirations in a minutę. And probably evcrvone bas observed what quick and short breaths the average horse takes when running; that. however, means an overstraining, and premature wearing out of some of the maehinery. And the average horse is, notoriously, a short-lived animal.

The Evils of Short and Shallow Breathing.

In superficial and short respiration one portion of the lungs is used too much, and thereby overstraincd, whilst another part, through disusc, loses by degrees its working capacity. The destructive effects of short respiration are not limited to the lungs alone. They affect the whole cir-culation, and, what is worst of all, the heart. It is a wcll known fact that the necd for air is inereased by hard physi-cal work or excrtion. It is, therefore, obvious that the breathings, if short, must be morę rapid and tnore freąuent in order to securc a sutficicnt supply of air. Scientists reckon that the heart has a tendency to beat 4 tirries to each respiration. If, then, the respirations of a horse, or of a badly trained athlete, reach the number, say, of 140 per minutę—which is not unusual—this means that the heart attempts to beat 560 times ! But this is an impossibility, and the result will then be a very irregular pulsation of the heart, the one beat stumbling " on the hccls ” of the other,

xo