Page:Athletics and Manly Sport (1890).djvu/133

108 higher intelligence applied in the case of college oarsmen and gymnasts), it is a fact that to-day almost every boxer, and many other athletes, trained for a contest, are over-trained and seriously weakened. Quite recently, I saw a man on the day of his contest, whom his trainer spoke of as being "in splendid condition—hard as nails; lost twenty pounds in six weeks." The man was gaunt; there was a look in his eye that was unnatural. His muscular system was wonderful to look on; but it had drained almost his entire nervous vitality. He could bear hammering, and he could strike hard; but the subtle and precious moral and nervous strength that would sustain him in a close fight, enable him to endure, and to leap into renewed opportunity, was drained dry to feed his hard muscles. He was naturally a brave and confident man; but that day, when the struggle tired and tested him, and his muscles were weary with opposition, he had no nervous force to sustain him, and he suffered, dodged, and at last yielded, half-beaten, like a coward. The man had been trained out of humanity into a spiritless and thoughtless animal.

It is notorious that "over-training" leads to a condition of system in which the sufferers describe themselves as "fallen to pieces." The most peculiar symptom is a sudden loss of voluntary