450 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



for men who wish to try for positions on these organizations. The 

 candidates are put into regular training in the gymnasium, while the 

 season prevents exercise out-of-doors. Nearly a hundred men come 

 forward, who are actually in training for at least one hour a day. 

 They are required to live rightly in all respects. Each man is bound 

 to avoid excesses of all kinds. The force of a public opinion created 

 by the sight of these men attending to their physical development, 

 and living according to laws and rules, acts upon the college world to 

 encourage regularity of life and obedience to authority. It is a moral 

 power in the community. As soon as the season permits, the men are 

 sent out-of-doors. The crews take their seats in the boats. The nines 

 take their positions in the field. The spring regatta terminates the 

 practice of the class crews, but, as that event occurs about three weeks 

 before the June examinations, and five weeks before the close of the 

 college year, it does not leave the young men a long time without ex- 

 ercise. The University, Consolidated, and Freshman Nines, the La- 

 crosse Team, and the University Crew (with sometimes a second eight), 

 continue their practice much longer, some of them stopping work 

 only after the close of the college year. 



Now, it may be said that the writer has only shown that regular 

 exercise has been secured during a few weeks of the first term to one 

 hundred and forty men at the most, and during the whole winter term 

 to one hundred men ; and in the spring and summer to one hundred 

 men part of the term, and to half that number during the whole of 

 the term. Granted. But there are other organizations which induce 

 men to exercise. The Athletic Association has already been men- 

 tioned. This gives three exhibitions ; one during the winter or early 

 spring in the gymnasium, and two in the open air, one in the summer 

 and one in the fall. The Dunham Rowing Club has a membership of 

 forty-four men. Then there are canoe clubs, tennis clubs, and gun 

 clubs. It would be putting the estimate too low to say that at least 

 half of the undergraduate members of the academic and scientific de- 

 partments get quite a regular amount of systematic out-door exercise 

 from, or in consequence of, the present system of college athletics. 

 This activity, too, has been mainly the outgrowth of the attention 

 given to boating and to base-ball. They had the first regular organi- 

 zations, and the others have taken pattern from them. It is no argu- 

 ment against the system that all the members of the university do 

 not take advantage of it. The need of exercise is met, and oppor- 

 tunities for regular and systematic exercise are given, with induce- 

 ments to take it, which do act upon at least half of the membership of 

 the two departments most in need of it. The system might do more 

 good if time were set apart by the various Faculties for the purpose of 

 encouraging exercise, but in considering the system it must be borne 

 in mind that it has grown up in a continual struggle for existence ; 

 and, until within a few years, without either help from graduates or 



