An athletic training is productive of a more complete oxidation of the nitrogenous materials of the body, and, therefore, of a more economic utilization of these substances. In those cases in which there is lack of physical training, sudden muscular exertion is followed by a waste of nitrogenous matter.
The Effect of Brain Fatigue on Body Fatigue and Vice Versa.—Brain fatigue makes the sense of touch less delicate. Similarly, muscle fatigue affects brain power; severe muscular exertion may bring a disinclination and incapacity for brain work. Hard exercise uses up nerve force, and also causes the circulation of waste-products in the blood, and so the action of the brain is hindered. On the other hand, many people who do a great deal of brain work know that an early morning walk, a pull on the river, is most refreshing and stimulating, and actually makes them more capable of doing good brain work; that is, if they are in fair training and do not take enough exercise to make them tired.
It is beyond question that a dull gymnastic drill, coming after hours of hard school work, may be a very heavy tax on the brain and nerves, and can hardly be a relaxation. Outdoor exercises, which require practically no brain work and a good deal of muscular exercise, would do good, such as walking, running, jumping, and various kinds of games; while, on the contrary, exercises of skill would be a serious tax.
The suggestion has been widely accepted, that brain work should occupy the morning hours, while technical education, such as singing, drawing, and physical training, should be given in the afternoon.
Marks for Physical Efficiency.—The tests suggested some fifteen years ago by Sir Francis Galton, the eminent English scientist, for assigning marks for physical qualifications were the following: First, breathing capacity; second, strength tests, both of them to be regarded with reference to the stature and the weight; third, quickness of response to a signal, made either to the eye or ear; fourth, keenness of eye-sight; fifth, keenness of hearing; sixth, color sense.
Dr. Sargent, realizing the usefulness of these tests in measuring physical efficiency, included them in the physical examinations of the Harvard students. The strength tests consist in the strength of each forearm, of the back of the legs, the dip, the pull up, and the lung capacity. The combination of these seven tests is known as the intercollegiate strength test, and is the best means as yet devised for measuring the general muscular strength and the respiratory power.
The Advantages Derived from Athletic Sports.—Nothing can take the place of athletic sports to develop strong vigorous bodies in girls and young women. While formal gymnastics have both an educational and corrective value, and lay the foundation for athletic sports, they cannot take the place of outdoor sports to develop organic vigor, physical and moral courage, self-reliance, judgment, self-control, decision, and ethical training, a consideration for the rights of others, and a relaxation, particularly from mental work. Athletics are to youth what play is to children. Groos tells us that a function of play is to furnish an outlet for exuberance and animal spirits in the young.
The Ethical Value of Sports for Women.—First come the benefits to the individual and second the benefits to the community, and it is a self-evident fact that that which promotes the highest development of the individual raises the standard of the community.
The benefits accruing to the individual are physical, esthetic, and psychologic; and as the result of the development of the individual along these lines will result the fourth benefit, the social or the “community good.”
Municipal governments are beginning to recognize the fact that the maintenance of public playgrounds not merely promote the good of the individual, but lessen the death-rate, the poverty rate, the criminal rate, and it has been found that the working capacity of the people depend in some way upon the recreation afforded them.