PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 757 



work in the open air. It may be an heroic cure, requiring a good deal 

 of will-force in cold weather, but it is an infallible and the only radi- 

 cal remedy. In half a day the nasal ducts and the perspiratory ex- 

 halants will throw off irritating matters which would defy the drug- 

 doctor for a couple of weeks, or yield only to exercise their influence 

 in another direction, for poison-remedies merely change the form of a 

 disease. But the beneficial effect of out-door exercise is not limited 

 to the respiratory organs : their quickened function reacts on the di- 

 gestive apparatus, on the nervous system, and through the nerves on 

 the mind ; true mental and physical vigor in any form can be main- 

 tained only on a liberal allowance of life-air ; those who feed their 

 lungs on miasma become strangers to that exuberant health which 

 makes bare existence a luxury. After years of in-door life the victims 

 of melancholy, dyspepsia, and dull headaches come to accept their 

 discomforts as the normal condition of mankind, but upon the first 

 appearance of such disorders our instinct suggests the cause and the 

 cure with an urgency which makes confinement in the atmosphere of 

 our northern dwelling-houses the greatest affliction of childhood. If 

 we reflect on the fact that our earth is surrounded by a respirable at- 

 mosphere of at least eight hundred million cubic miles, it seems a sad 

 comment on the enlightenment of modern civilization that the unsat- 

 isfied thirst after life-air should inflict more misery upon millions of 

 our fellow-men than hunger and all the hardships of poverty combined. 

 " On the day of judgment," says Jean Paul, "God will perhaps par- 

 don you for starving your children when bread was so dear ; but, if he 

 should charge you with stinting them in his free air, what answer 

 shall you make ? " 



Perfect health depends upon a daily supply of fresh air as much 

 as on our daily bread ; but within certain limits the human organism 

 is capable of adapting itself to abnormal circumstances. A man may 

 accustom himself to devour his weekly allowance of solid food at a 

 single meal, and in a similar way the vitalizing elements of air and 

 sunshine can be hoarded up allotropically, for all we know for days, 

 weeks, and months in advance. The Zooloo hunter who, after a six 

 days' fast, gets a chance to satisfy the cravings of his stomach; can 

 not be expected to content himself with half -pint rations d la Luigi 

 Cornaro, and in midsummer, after six months of sedentary life, a boy 

 should get his fill of out-door exercises ; let him drink sunlight at 

 every pore, do not stint his allowance of oxygen, compensate him for 

 long arrears of woodland air and mountain-rambles. 



With a little experience vacation trips can be managed very cheap- 

 ly. Professor Jordan, of the Ilefeld Pedagogium, takes his summer 

 boarders to the Hartz, or even to the Austrian Alps, at an aggregate 

 daily expense of fifteen marks (three and a half dollars) for twenty 

 or twenty-five big boys with North-German appetites. They carry 

 their own beds in the form of a plaid and a pair of foot-sacks (boot- 



