Page:Japanese Physical Training (Hancock).djvu/86

 50 the beginner that, with some important variations, the work used for bringing the lower limbs to their highest pitch of strength and endurance is identical with that employed in making the limbs all that they should be in a thoroughly normal man or woman. In addition it will be discovered that all of the exercises for the leg bring the arm more or less into play.

There is one important phase of leg culture that is understood all the world over—walking! Our little brown friends of the Orient contend that there cannot be sufficient strength of the legs unless a few miles a day are made on foot. But they also contend that the resistant leg exercises are just as absolutely necessary to the development of a pair of legs that will stand the strain of what Occidentals would call more than normal work. Students in Japanese schools make frequent and long pilgrimages on foot to shrines and other points of historic interest. These journeys require many days of tramping. With their established record of superiority over all the men of other nations in marching, the Japanese