The chief thing in the care of the finger nails is to keep them clean. Each boy should possess and use a nail brush. Always wash the hands thoroughly before eating, and use the end of a nail file to remove the accumulation still remaining under the nails. Keep the nails properly trimmed. They should not be too long nor too short. If long they are liable to break and if short to be sensitive. Biting the nails is a filthy practice and mutilates the fingers dreadfully and makes them unsightly. It is a very hard habit to overcome ofttimes and will require persistent effort in order to succeed. By keeping the nails smooth the tendency to bite them will to some extent be overcome. A bitter application to the nails will often remind one of the habit, as often the biting is done unconsciously. The nails should never be pared with a knife; a curved pair of scissors is better as the cutting should be done in a curved direction; but the best method is to use a file. The skin overhanging the nails should be pressed back once a week to keep them shapely. Rubbing the nails with a nail buffer or cloth will keep them polished.
Sleep
One thing a growing boy wants to be long on is sleep, and yet he is most apt to be careless about it. It is during sleep that a boy grows most and catches up. During his waking hours he tears down and burns up more tissue than he builds. Good, sound and sufficient sleep is essential to growth, strength, {232} and endurance. A boy scout should have at least nine or ten hours sleep out of every twenty-four. If you lose out on this amount on one day, make it up the next. Whenever unusually tired, or when you feel out of trim, stay in bed a few hours more if it is possible. A boy should wake up each morning feeling like a fighting cock. When he doesn't he ought to get to bed earlier that night. Sleep is a wonderful restorative and tonic. It helps to store up energy and conserve strength.
Sleeping Out of Doors
The conditions under which one sleeps are as important as the length of time one sleeps. Many people are finding it wonderfully helpful and invigorating to sleep out of doors. Often a back porch can be arranged, or, in summer, a tent can be pitched in the yard. But, by all means, the sleeping room should be well ventilated. Windows should be thrown wide open. Avoid drafts. If the bed is in such relation to the windows as to cause the wind to blow directly on it, a screen can be used to divert it or a sheet hung up as protection. Good, fresh, cool air is a splendid tonic. In winter open windows are a splendid preparation for camping out in summer.
Conservation
In this chapter much has been said of the active measures which a boy should take in order to become strong and well. We should be equally concerned in saving and storing up natural forces we already have. In the body of every boy, who has reached his teens, the Creator of the universe has sown a very important fluid. This fluid is the most wonderful material in all the physical world. Some parts of it find their way into the blood, and through the blood give tone to the muscles, power to the brain, and strength to the nerves. This fluid is the sex fluid. When this fluid appears in a boy's body, it works a wonderful change in him. His chest deepens, his shoulders broaden, his voice changes, his ideals are changed and enlarged. It gives him the capacity for deep feeling, for rich emotion. Pity the boy, therefore, who has wrong ideas of this important function, because they will lower his ideals of life. These organs actually secrete into the blood material that makes a boy manly, strong, and noble. Any habit which a boy has that causes this fluid to be discharged from the body tends to weaken his strength, to make him less able to resist disease, and often unfortunately fastens upon him habits which later in life he {233} cannot break. Even several years before this fluid appears in the body such habits are harmful to a growing boy.
To become strong, therefore, one must be pure in thought and clean in habit. This power which I have spoken of must be conserved, because this sex function is so deep and strong that there will come times when temptation to wrong habits will be very powerful. But remember that to yield means to sacrifice strength and power and manliness.
For boys who desire to know more of this subject we would suggest a splendid book by Dr. Winfield S. Hall, entitled, "From Youth into Manhood." Every boy in his teens who wants to know the secret of strength, power, and endurance should read this book.
NOTES