The following quotation is also sound common sense:—“The better your condition, the less chance there is of your doing what boxers have generally to do, and what I have often heard batsmen express as sparring for wind. If you should care to go in for a system of training, it can only do good; for in every department of the game, the better condition you are in, the better chances you have of doing yourself justice. Good condition means stamina, and you certainly want this to play a long innings; and solely for the want of it I have seen batsmen get out. You certainly require it, should you have a day’s outing in the field, especially so if you are a bowler; so my advice is to make it a rule to be as fit as possible.”
But to return to breathing, breathing slowly outwards, together with a relaxing of the muscles, tends not only to endurance (by economy of force), but also to calmness, patience, and contentment. All players, and especially the nervous, need a very fine course of nerve-training in these.
With the calmness, however, there must be promptness and quickness. The senses must send a quick message to the brain, which must then give a quick order to the muscles, which in their turn must quickly work together in harmony. As to the senses, we need to have a clear eye, and—a much under-estimated help—a keen ear. Therefore we need clear blood, which will give us also clean joints and clean limbs—joints free from deposits, limbs free from excessive fat or water or waste. We need a brisk intellect, including a sensitive observation and retentive memory. These may all be trained by the Macdonald Smith System, which I should like to see as a part of national education. It is not complete, but it is extremely useful. It will help, for example, to give a quick and fairly strong wrist without that stiffness which is singularly fatal in nearly every province of the game.
Exercises according to this system, together with exercises in complete extensions, will be suggested in other chapters. I should like to do away altogether with that popular test “How large does the muscle look?” and to substitute for it, among other tests, “How far does the limb stretch?” In the other chapters will also be emphasised the importance of balance: one must be able to use weight without loss of poise.
The subject of training has been dealt with in a special volume of this library, and food in particular has formed the subject of “Muscle, Brain, and Diet.” Here we must be content to select a very few hints of a general kind. Let us begin with food.
To what we shall say there will be exceptions. Some players are at their very best after the grossest excesses, perhaps partly because the blood has been cleared for the time by the quantities of stimulants; but such excesses cannot be relied on to produce the very best. Moreover, few such men last long, even though for a while the outward eye sees little or no decay. If any one thinks he must have an occasional “bust,” let it be very occasional. Far safer advice would be as follows:—Find out what is nourishing to you. Don’t assume that it must be meat. It may be cheese or Plasmon, or the pulses or nut foods or good grain-foods, all of which have plenty of blood-forming and cell-building proteid, as this little table will show:—
APPROXIMATE AMOUNT OF PROTEID IN VARIOUS FOODS (UNCOOKED).
Beef 20.
Fish 10.
Eggs 12 to 16.
Cheese 20 to 30.
Plasmon 70 to 80.
Peas (dried) 21.
Lentils and haricots 23.
Nuts 10 to 24 (walnuts and filberts 14).
Hovis 10.
Wheat and whole-wheat products 11.
Roots and tubers, vegetables and salads, and most fruits, though useful for other purposes, are poor in proteid.
Take enough nourishment: let that be your first rule. Take say four to five ounces of proteid a day, trying and testing several sources when you have little at stake (as on Sundays). You can generally control one of your daily meals. Start the experiment there. Eat slowly and enjoy the taste fully. Don’t swallow disagreeable masses of vegetables or slops: that is neither sense nor science. On Sunday give the in-side a holiday: that is both sense and religion. Let the Sabbath rest for the digestion be your second rule.