How to Acquire Rhythmic Breathing 345 



lungs should be used, but men and women have 

 each adopted their special method of defeating 

 Nature; the former, from neglect of clavicular 

 (upper chest) breathing, furnishing the more vic- 

 tims of tuberculosis; and the latter, from their 

 constriction of the waist-line, inhibiting all the 

 lower muscles from activity, thus often causing 

 atrophy of the lower lobes of the lungs, and ren- 

 dering practically immovable the vital organs just 

 beneath the diaphragm; which encourages a long 

 train of suffering. Semi-invalidism and early de- 

 cay are inevitable under such conditions. Yet a 

 New York authority upon voice-culture says that 

 with correct deep-breathing, " no voice need lose 

 its beauty till one, two, or even three, decades 

 after the fortieth birthday is passed." 



Now, deep, rhythmic breathing uses no one of 

 these restricted " registers," but does employ all 

 three in one. Habitual inhalations should be pro- 

 longed till every respiratory muscle has been called 

 into action and every lung cell is distended. This 

 cannot be accomplished without a perfectly free 

 and strong elastic diaphragm. It is profoundly 

 important that one learn not only how to make it so 

 faithful practice will do it but also its exact 

 office in this life function. 



The diaphragm is nearly the shape of an in- 

 verted basin, an irregular arch or crescent in 

 every dimension. Acting like a bellows, when 



