The Exercises.
I. The preliminary exercises serve principally to strengthen the arms and legs, and to increase their activity, to give the body a graceful carriage, to accustom it to labour, and thus prepare it for the other exercises.
II. Running for a length of time, and with celerity. If the pupil follows the prescribed rules, and is not deterred by a little fatigue in the first six lessons, he will soon be able to run three English miles in from twenty to twenty-five minutes. Some of Mr. V.’s pupils have been able to run for two hours incessantly, and without being much out of breath.
III. Leaping in distance and height, with and without a pole. Every pupil will soon convince himself to what degree the strength of the arms, the energy of the muscles of the feet, and good carriage of the body, are increased by leaping, particularly with a pole. Almost every one learns in a short time to leap his own height, and some of the pupils have been able to leap ten or eleven feet high. It is equally easy to learn to leap horizontally over a space three times the length of the body; even four times that length has been attained.
IV. Climbing up masts, ropes, and ladders. Every pupil will soon learn to climb up a mast, rope, or ladder of twenty-four feet high; and after six months’ exercise, even of thirty-four or thirty-six feet. The use of this exercise is very great in strengthening the arms.
V. The exercises on the pole and parallel bars, serve in particular to expand the chest, to strengthen the muscles of the breast and small of the back, and to make the latter flexible. In a short time, every pupil will be enabled to perform exercises of which he could not have thought himself capable, provided that he do not deviate from the prescribed course and rules.
VI. Vaulting, which is considered one of the principal exercises for the increase of strength, activity, good carriage of the body, and courage, which employs and improves the powers of almost all parts of the body, and has hitherto always been taught as an art by itself, is brought to some perfection in three months.
VII. Fencing with the broad sword, throwing lances, wrestling, and many other exercises.
All these exercises so differ from one another, that generally those parts of the body which are employed in one, rest in another. Every lesson occupies from one hour and a half to two hours, its length depending on the degree of labour required for the exercises practised in it.