Another general set of questions which can be classified in an indefinite sort of way is the set which refers to training for long distances or short distances either for racing or for pleasure trips. General rules here can be laid down for training. In fact, the Interscholastic Sport Department is constantly giving suggestions in training for one particular event or another. Bicycle-training is practically the same as the preparation gone through by a man who is to run in the longer distances. Of course the principal part of the work is wheeling constantly day after day for certain distances, depending on the event for which we are training, gradually increasing speed or distance as the event is a short distance or a long tour. Muscular development and lung-power are required, and these must be practised by constant gymnasium work. Running slowly on the toes, rising and falling on one leg and then on the other many times, rising on the toes and falling back slowly on the heels two or three or four hundred times in succession without bending the knees—these exercise the proper leg muscles. But when the lungs and heart come into the question more care should be taken. Many strong men find that while their lungs and heart are vigorous for ordinary games, bicycling puts too great a strain on both, especially the latter. For instance, after riding steadily up hill and down hill for twenty miles at fifteen miles an hour, you begin to feel a stricture across the chest, you have that peculiar sensation as if you were tasting blood, and it is impossible to take a long satisfying breath which seems to "go" beyond a certain point down into your lungs. When these facts become noticeable, especially if you are not in the best of training, it is well to dismount and walk a little by your wheel, until you can mount again and ride with the mouth closed and the air entering your lungs through the nostrils. In fact, all riding should stop when the wheelman cannot breathe most of the time through his nose; otherwise the lungs are overtaxed, which may do no harm in occasional instances, but will in the end, if kept up, be injurious.
[A WONDERFUL VIOLIN.]
Wandering through the Italian quarter of New York lately, I came across a copy of Dante's Inferno. It was bound in very thick covers, and in looking it over a few days ago, I was much surprised to find a sort of pocket, partially disguised, in the under cover. It contained some sheets of manuscript written in a fine Italian hand. I had the manuscript translated, and found that it was a sort of diary of a young lad whose whole life must have been wrapped up in violins, for the records of his day-book are liberally interspersed with memorandums on that instrument. After reading the pages through, I found a little story among them, and for its curious interest, I give it herewith.
It seems the boy's family was of noble origin, and had grand designs for the future of their son, whose name was Paolo. Paolo, however, was averse to their ideas, as his only desire was violins, either to make them or play them, and ofttimes, in defiance of his father's orders, he would steal into a distant part of the house, and indulge in his love of playing. This had happened so frequently, and Paolo was fast growing to be a manly fellow, that his father rebuked him very strongly one day. He touched the sensitive chords of the musician's soul too much, and Paolo responded with hot words that led to his father's banishing him forever from the house.
Paolo went forth with his valuable violin, his one friend, as he thought, and passed on from town to town, city to city, playing for his living. He changed his name, and as time went by, his father, who sat brooding in sadness over his hasty action, never recognized in the name of a new brilliant maestro his banished son. A violin hung in front of his chair in the large hall, and he was accustomed to sitting there before it and dreaming of Paolo. One day, as the light of the afternoon was fast waning, he sat with eyes wandering over the instrument. Suddenly, almost like fairy music, the low sweet melody of a favorite piece of Paolo's came from the violin. He started back, fearing that he was mad; but no, the music was certainly coming from the violin. What could it mean? He seized it, and the moment he did so the music stopped. He dropped down in his chair again, and waited. Softly the strains came from the strings, and with a cry of grief the father called aloud for his son, only to hear a voice, and, turning, he found Paolo standing before him with outstretched arms. They were reconciled at last.
Paolo accounted for the wonderful music by leading his father to the other end of the hall and pointing to a small alcove behind a pillar, explained that everything spoken or played in that spot would cast the sound directly over to where the violin hung, and that as a boy he had discovered the wonderful echo, and experimented with it more than once. He had driven the nail in the wall years ago, and when he entered the hall upon his return, and saw his father sitting there before the violin, he resolved to try his love by use of that boyish experiment.
It would be hard to credit this story, were it not for the fact that such an echo is one of the show-cards of the guides in the Capitol at Washington, and several others are more or less famous through the world.
Hubert Earl.