Related article: gasp for breath or feel ill, but he must nevertheless wait until the towelled attendants come to take him out to the region of cold slabs and tepid water. Could anything be further from the truth. And yet this is hardly a more far-fetched story than some of those which have been told about athletes and athleticism. Even now, when training is almost universal, and rowing clubs, harrier clubs, bicycle clubs, swimming clubs, and what not are found everywhere, and upon a more or less enlightened prin- ciple the bulk of our youth train for something or other, the prin- ciples of training are but imper- fectly understood by those who have never undergone it. Since the St, James's Gazette discussion has been in progress one writer has mentioned the question of the training for the University Boat- race, and it must surely be in- jurious for any man about to row in an important boat-race, to starve himseH and work himself to death, in order to get fit. Good heavens ! Fancy the mem- ber of a University Eight (or for that matter of any other eight- oared crew) starving himself! Would that those who hold these opinions could see the breakfasts which are consumed by crews in training, or the dinners either. Before it became the fashion for the Oxford and Cambridge crews to follow the Apostolic fashion, and live in their own hired houses while at Putney, they used to stay at one or other of the hotels, and in one year the Oxford crew, be- ing desirous of getting away from the racket and inquisitiveness, incidental to a waterside house, decided to move up the street, and sent to the landlord of the required place for an estimate of the housekeeping expenses. These worked out on such moder- ate lines that the offer was closed with at once, and in due time the crew appeared. At breakfast on the following morning, a chop (and not a very large one either), was put before each man, and when that was consumed, the order was given to bring in the others. ** What others ? " in- quired mine host, and when he found what a training breakfast really meant, he is reported to have gone with tears in his eyes to the President of the Boat Club, to say that he had but an imper- fect acquaintance with the appe- tites of men in training, and he hoped that the contract would either be cancelled, or that some further remuneration would be paid. So much for the starvation of boats' crews. On the wider question of whether an athlete is a healthy man or not in after life, there is necessarily a good deal to be said on both sides. An athlete's pluck Midamor Tablets may be greater than his powers. He may be physically a weak man, in which case no amount of chops and steaks, or other train- ing diet, would render him fit to 302 bAlLY S MAGAZINE. [OCTORER withstand too violent exercise, though at the same time careful living might improve his health. There are, as everybody knows, a certain number of people in the world who have no particular tastes, or, if they have, lack the opportunity of gratifying them ; who are from early life compelled to attend to business, and who go from the cradle to the grave, with- out ever having once experienced real hunger, thirst, or fatigue. If they have to wait half an hour for a meal, they may say they are hungry or thirsty ; if they walk a mile further than usual they may say they are tired, but as for ever having mortified the flesh in any shape or form, they have- never done so. Now, starting with the theory that training is but imperfectly understood, we would ask any- body what objection there is to wholesome living. The man who, in the slang of the day, "does himself well,'* can hardly be said to live wholesomely, whereas Buy Midamor training, or at least training diet, which is " unlimited in quantity " (as the £10 a year school advertise- ments say), is comparatively plain in its nature, while the nature, and up to a certain extent the amount, of drinkables, are also regular. Now, a wholesome diet and regular hours are surely the first steps towards good health (we will not call it training for the present), and if to these we add a certain amount of exercise, a man is in a fair way to get fit. Let us put the question in another way. A young man, earning, say twenty-five shillings a week, is unable to indulge in the luxury of a five-course dinner, so he perhaps lives on chops, steaks, or a cut off the joint, which he washes down with either water or a glass of beer. Rather than spend some of his money on riding he perhaps walks the three, four, or five miles which separates his home from his place of busi- ness. Motives of economy again may induce him to leave off smok- ing, and here we have, for all practical purposes, a man in train- ing. The objectors will say, no, you have not, because the exercise he takes is really nothing more than gentle exercise, just enough to prevent the limbs from stiffen- ing, and so forth, and this is the line taken up by more than one contributor to the Si, /ames's Gazette discussion. But then, if a wholesome diet be eaten and regular hours kept, and even moderate exercise indulged in, a man speedily gets into such good health, that what would be moderate exercise to one who fed less carefully, and lived less regu- larly, would be absolutely no exercise at all to him. He would probably walk twenty miles with far less fatigue to himself, than a bon vivant would • walk five at a slow pace. One of the most dangerous things a man can do is to under- take hard exercise with no pre- liminary training. The plethoric gentlemen who sometimes cut their trains rather fine, and who have to run the last 200 or 300 yards, on seeing the train ap- proaching, have been known to end their lives in the railway carriage, or on the station plat- form, for no other reason than that they have undertaken a task which is beyond their powers. And here it may be mentioned that if instead of sitting down they had walked about for a minute or two, they might have warded off the evil moment — but that by the way. Just, therefore, as pace is a relative term so is exercise. What would kill one man is simple child's play to another. Who is 1897.3