To resume:  these matters, and, indeed, many more, receive effectual attention from the moment when the child is born.  Every good attained goes on increasing under direct and collateral influences, until by a prolific and cumulative process, extraordinary and beneficial results are obtained in lieu of the evils that would otherwise have arisen.  In short, to understand fully the extent of the good achieved, one must have been, as I was, a witness of the means and their effects—­of the marvellous consequences of our attention to “little things.”

XXXIII.

GYMNASTICS.

     “Let your statue be beautiful, but neglect not the pedestal, lest
     with every adverse wind it receive a shock.”

Our care of the future man is not, as I have said, confined to his infancy, but is extended to all the critical periods of life.  The proper development of the frame and of manly qualities is looked upon as an essential part of the boy’s education, and much of the strength, beauty, and longevity of the people is due to the physical training of the student.

Formerly little discrimination was used in the selection of bodily as of mental exercises; the same exercises being allotted to the brave and the timid, the weak and the strong boy.

Now, on the other hand, the exercise is adapted to the boy’s strength and physical organization, which often differ as much as his genius from that of his companions.  Exercises beneficial to one constitution are prejudicial to another, and would, perhaps, develop a part of the body already having a tendency to exaggeration.

Thus a youth inclined to be tall and lanky, or whose limbs are disposed to be too long for symmetry, is not allowed the same exercises as those of a youth with short limbs or inclined to be corpulent.

We have numerous gymnastic exercises.  Some parts of our apparatus are much like yours, as, for instance, a cross-bar, on which the boy swings, holding on with his hands.

In the case just mentioned a tall, thin, long-limbed boy would not be permitted to use this bar; whilst a boy with short limbs and inclined to corpulency would be encouraged to use it daily.

A medical man attached to the college attends on the gymnastic ground to observe the efforts each boy is obliged to make in performing his exercises.  When the exercises are ended, the doctor examines the boy’s pulse, and, with the aid of an instrument invented for the purpose, tests the heat of his brain.  The boy with whom the exercises agree will show a healthy heat and a strong, full pulse; whilst others will have the brain extremely hot, with the pulse very quick, but feeble.  The doctor having formed his opinion, orders that these boys should discontinue the exercises antagonistic to their system, and they are led to those more adapted to their capabilities.  The weaker boys are also often separated from the stronger, to prevent that overstraining to which a weak but high-spirited lad is frequently impelled by the emulation of example.