MENTAL CONTROL OF THE MUSCLES 209 



to confine the attention to the definite object of doing some- 

 thing with the forefinger or thumb, and that therefore if 

 attention were concentrated on the pressure by the ball of 

 the thumb, wrist action would be avoided. I knew then, 

 however, that the mental activity which a consciously 

 enforced grasp of the rod entails would prevent the wrist 

 action from occurring, and hence my advice, the value of 

 which but not the actual result which attends it is 

 recognised by the author of the book previously mentioned. 



It is not, however, necessary to force the mind to make 

 any increase in effort, in order to attain that controlled 

 rigidity of the wrist, which is necessary when effecting 

 ninety- nine out of every hundred of the daily actions made 

 by the hand. This author is, however, by this advice, 

 unwittingly helping his readers, for he is preventing or 

 neutralizing the faulty consequences of the other advice he 

 offers, the necessity of a pivotal wrist action ; for if 

 " attention " be maintained in order to grasp the rod by the 

 finger and thumb, however light may be the grasp, this 

 enforces a constant angle between the forearm and the rod, 

 and prevents a wrist action, and by so doing allows the most 

 important muscles of the forearm to control the movement 

 of the rod, a consummation devoutly to be desired, but which 

 is defeated if a pivotal action of the wrist be effected. 



The beginner should remember that the muscles he should 

 employ in the different movements required in casting are 

 those which he has through habit been using from his infancy 

 in a variety of other and distinct actions, and although the 

 object he has in view when using them may be a new one, 

 yet concentration of thought will soon link them into a 

 well-ordered sequence. 



The movements made by the hand in casting are three 

 the raise, the back action and the forward action but each 

 of these movements has in other of our every-day actions 



15 



