Page:The physical training of children (IA 39002011126464.med.yale.edu).pdf/306

 cloyed and disordered, and the keen appetite, so characteristic of youth, will be blunted, and ill health will ensue. "In a public education, boys early learn temperance, and if the parents and friends would give them less money upon their usual visits, it would be much to their advantage, since it may justly be said that a great part of their disorders arise from surfeit, plus occidit gula quam gladius (gluttony kills more than the sword)." How true is the saying that "many people dig their graves with their teeth." You may depend upon it that more die from stuffing than from starvation! AIR AND EXERCISE. 330. Have you any remarks to make on fresh air and exercise for boys and girls?

Girls and boys, especially the former, are too much confined within doors. It is imperatively necessary, if you wish them to be strong and healthy, that they should have plenty of fresh air and exercise; remember, I mean fresh air—country air, not the close air of a town. By exercise, I mean the free unrestrained use of the limbs. Girls, in this respect, are unfortunately worse off than boys, although they have similar muscles to develop, similar lungs that require fresh air, and similar nerves to be braced and strengthened. It is not considered lady-*like to be natural—all their movements must be measured by rule and compass!

The reason why so many young girls of the present day are so sallow, undersized, and ill-shaped, is for the want of air and exercise. After a time the want of air and exercise, by causing ill health, makes them slothful and indolent—it is a trouble for them to move from their chairs!