NITEOGENIZED PRINCIPLES. 375 



lar muscles, their development can be carried to a high 

 degree of perfection, the rest of the muscular system under- 

 going no change ; or the entire muscular system may, by 

 appropriate general exercise, be made to increase consider- 

 ably in volume, and a person may become capable of great 

 endurance, under an ordinary diet. It is surprising, some- 

 times, to see how small an amount of well-regulated exercise 

 will accomplish this end. But if it be desired to attain the 

 maximum of strength and endurance, it is necessary to 

 carefully regulate the diet as well as the exercise. Those 

 who are in the habit of " training " men, particularly for 

 pugilistic encounters, have long since demonstrated prac- 

 tically certain facts which physiologists have been rather 

 slow to appreciate. By carefully regulating the diet, con- 

 fining it chiefly to nitrogenized articles, eliminating fat 

 entirely, and reducing the starchy elements to the minimum ; 

 by regulating the exercise so as to increase the nutritive 

 activity of all the muscles to the greatest possible extent ; 

 by increasing the respiratory activity by running, etc., and 

 removing from the body all the unnecessary adipose tissue ; 

 by all these means, which favor nutritive assimilation by 

 the nitrogenized elements of the organism, a man may be 

 u trained " so as to be capable of immense muscular effort 

 and endurance. 



The process of training, skilfully carried out, is in 

 accordance with what are now admitted as physiological 

 laws ; though it has been practised for years by igno- 

 rant persons, and its rules are entirely empirical. It is 

 stated that the athletes of ancient times, while vigorously 

 exercising the muscles, favored by their diet the development 

 of fat, so as to be better able to resist the blows of their an- 

 tagonists. 1 However this may be, since the English prize-ring 

 has been regularly organized, or since about the middle of the 

 last century, the system of training has been entirely differ- 

 ent, and fat has been, as far as possible, removed from every 



1 HARRISON, Athletic Training and Health, Oxford and London, 1869, p. 87. 



