WILL DAILY PHYSICAL EXERCISE FOR GIRLS PAY?
Observe the girls in any of our cities or towns, as they pass to or from
school, and see how few of them are at once blooming, shapely, and strong.
Some are one or the other, but very few are all combined, while a decided
majority are neither one of them. Instead of high chests, plump arms;
comely figures, and a graceful and handsome mien, you constantly see flat
chests, angular shoulders, often round and warped forward, with scrawny
necks, pipe-stem arms, narrow backs, and a weak walk. Not one girl in a
dozen is thoroughly erect, whether walking, standing, or sitting. Nearly
every head is pitched somewhat forward. The arms are frequently held
almost motionless, and there is a general lack of spring and elasticity in
their movements. Fresh, blooming complexions are so rare as to attract
attention. Among eyes, plenty of them pretty, sparkling, or intelligent,
but few have vigor and force. If any dozen girls, taken at random, should
place their hands side by side on a table, many, if not most, of these
hands would be found to lack beauty and symmetry, the fingers, and indeed
the whole hand, too often having a weak, undeveloped, nerveless look.
Now watch these girls at play. See how few of their games bring them
really vigorous exercise. Set them to running, and hardly one in the
party has the swift, graceful, gliding motion she might so readily
acquire. Not one can run any respectable distance at a good pace. There
is abundant vivacity and spirit, abundant willingness to play with great
freedom, but very little such play as there might be, and which would
pay so well. Most of their exercise worth calling vigorous is for their
feet alone, the hands seldom having much to do. The girls of the most
favored classes are generally the poorest players. The quality and color
of their clothing necessitates their avoiding all active, hearty play,
while it is the constant effort of nurse or governess to repress that
superabundance of spirits which ought to belong to every boy and girl.
Holding one's elbows close to the body while walking, and keeping the
hands nearly or quite motionless, may accord with the requirements of
fashionable life, but it's terribly bad for the arms, keeping them poor,
indifferent specimens, when they might be models of grace and beauty.
As the girl comes home from school, not with one book only, but often six
or eight, instead of looking light and strong and free, she is too often
what she really appears to be, pale and weak. So many books suggest a
large amount of work for one day, certainly for one evening, and the
impression received is that she is overworked, while the truth frequently
is that the advance to be made in each book is but trifling, and the
aggregate, not at all large, by no means too great for the same girl were
she strong and hearty. It is not the mental work which is breaking her
down, but there is no adequate physical exercise to build her up. See what
ex-Surgeon-General Hammond says, in his work on "Sleep", as to the ability
to endure protracted brain-work without ill result:
"It is not the mere quantity of brain-work which is the chief factor
in the production of disease. The emotional conditions under which
work is performed is a far more important matter. A man of trained
mental habits can bear with safety an almost incredible amount of
brain-toil, provided he is permitted to work without distraction or
excitement, in the absence of disquieting cares and anxieties. It is
not brain-work, in fact, that kills, but brain-_worry_."
The girl, of course, has not the strength for the protracted effort of the
matured man, nor is such effort often required of her. Her studying is
done quietly at home, undisturbed, usually, by any such cares and
responsibilities as the man encounters. Hers is generally brain-work, not
brain-worry. Yet the few hours a day exhaust her, because her vital
system, which supports her brain, is feeble and inefficient. No girl is at
school over six hours out of the twenty-four, and, deducting the time
taken for recitation, recess, and the various other things which are not
study, five hours, or even less, will cover the time she gives to actual
brain-work in school, with two, or perhaps three, hours daily out of
school. With the other sixteen hours practically her own, there is ample
time for all the vigorous physical exercise she needs or could take, and
yet allow ten, or even twelve, of those hours for sleep or eating. But
notice, in any of these off-hours, what exercise these girls take. They
walk to and fro from school, they play a few minutes at recess, they may
take an occasional irregular stroll besides, and may indulge in a game of
croquet, but all the time intent on their conversation, never thinking of
the exercise itself, and the benefit it brings. Such things fill up the
measure of the daily physical exercise of thousands of our American girls.
It is the same thing for nearly all, save those from the poorest classes.
And what is the result? Exactly what such exercise--or, rather, such lack
of it--would bring. The short, abrupt run, the walk to or from school,
the afternoon stroll, or the miscellaneous standing about--none of these
call for or beget strength of limb, depth of chest, or vitality. None of
these exercises is more than almost any flat-chested, half-developed girl
could readily accomplish without serious effort, and, going through them
for years, she would need little more strength than she had at first.
But all this time her mental work comes in no meagre allowance. _It_ is
all the time pushing forward. Subjects are set before her, to grasp and
master which requires every day hours of close application for months
together. The number of them is also enlarging, and the task is constantly
becoming more severe. A variety of influences spurs her steadily onward.
Maybe it is emulation and determination which urges her on, not only to do
well, but to excel. Maybe it is to gratify the teacher's pride, and a
desire to show the good fruit of her work. Perhaps oftener than anything
else the girl is in dread of being dropped into another class, and she
resolves to remain with her present one at all hazards.
But with all this there is an advance in the amount and difficulty of the
brain-work. No distinction is made between the delicate girl and the
strong one. To those of a like age come like tasks. The delicate girl,
from her indifference to physical effort, finding that for the time her
weakness of body does not interfere with a ready-working brain, gradually
inclines to draw even more away from livelier games and exercises, in
which she does not excel, and to get more at her books. Can there be much
doubt as to the result a few years later? Is it any wonder that the
neglected body develops some partial weakness, or too often general
debility? Is it at all a rare thing, in the observation of any one, to
notice that this weakness, this debility, are very apt to become chronic,
and that the woman, later on in life, is a source of anxiety and a burden
to her friends, when instead of this she might have been a valued helper?
Now, if the body, during the growing years, was called on to do
nothing which should even half develop it, while the brain was pushed
nearly to its utmost, does it take long to decide whether such a
course was a wise one? Leaving out entirely the discomfort to the
body, is that a sensible system of education which leaves a girl
liable to become weak, if not entirely broken down, before she is well
on in middle age? Is this not like giving great care to moral and
mental education alone, and actually doing almost nothing for their
physical nature? Is this not an irrational and one-sided course, and
sure to beget a one-sided person? And yet is not that just what is
going on to-day with a great majority of the young girls in our land?
The moment it is conceded that a delicate body can be made a robust one,
that moment it is equally plain that there can be an almost incalculable
gain in the comfort and usefulness of the possessor of that body, not
only during all the last half of her life, but through the first half as
well. And yet, to persons familiar with what judicious, daily physical
exercise has done, and can do, for a delicate body, there is no more
doubt but that this later strength, and even sturdiness, can be acquired
than that the algebra or geometry, which at first seems impenetrable,
can be gradually mastered. The rules which bring success in each are in
many respects identical. Begin to give the muscles of the hand and
forearm, for instance, as vigorous and assiduous use as these
mathematical studies bring to the brain, and the physical grasp will as
surely and steadily improve as does the mental. Give not only the
delicate girls, but all girls, exercises which shall insure strong and
shapely limbs, and chests deep, full, and high, beginning these
exercises mildly, and progressing very gradually, correcting this high
shoulder, or that stoop, or this hollow chest, or that overstep, and
carrying on this development as long as the school-days last. Let this
be done under a teacher as familiar with her work as the mathematical
instructor is with his, and what incalculable benefit would accrue, not
to this generation alone, but to their descendants as well!
But will not this physical training dull the mind for its work? If
protracted several hours, or the greater part of each day, as with the
German peasant-woman in the field, or the Scotch fish-woman with her
wares, no doubt it would. But if Maclaren of Oxford wanted but a little
while each day to increase the girth of the chests of a dozen British
soldiers three inches apiece in four months, is this very moderate
allowance likely to work much mental dulness? Did Charles Dickens's
seven to twelve miles afoot daily interfere with some masterly work
which his pen produced each day? Did Napoleon's whole days spent in the
saddle tell very seriously on his mental operations, and prevent him
from conceiving and carrying out military and strategic work which will
compare favorably with any the world's history tells of?
And what if this daily exercise, beside the bodily benefit and improvement
which ensues, should also bring actually better mental work? Unbending the
bow for a little while, taking the tension from the brain for a few
minutes, and depleting it by expanding the chest to its fullest capacity,
and increasing the circulation in the limbs--these, instead of impairing
that brain, will repair it, and markedly improve its tone and vigor.
There ought to be in every girls' school in our land, for pupils of
every age, a system of physical culture which should first eradicate
special weaknesses and defects, and then create and maintain the
symmetry of the pupils, increasing their bodily vigor and strength up to
maturity. If several, or a majority, of the girls in a class have flat
or indifferent chests, put them in a squad which shall pay direct and
steady attention to raising, expanding, and strengthening the chest. If
many have a bad gait, some stepping too long, others too short, set them
aside for daily special attention to their step. If many, or nearly all,
have an inerect carriage, wholly lacking _la ligne_ of Dumas, then daily
insist on such exercises for them as shall straighten them up and keep
them up. The dancing-master teaches the girl to step gracefully and
accurately through various dancing-steps. To inculcate a correct length
of step, and method of putting the foot down and raising it in walking,
is not nearly so difficult a task. If the "setting-up" drill of the West
Pointer in a few weeks transforms the raw and ungainly country boy into
a youth of erect and military bearing, and insisting on that bearing at
all times throughout the first year gives the cadet a set and carriage
which he often retains through life, is there anything to hinder the
girl from acquiring an equally erect and handsome carriage of the body
if she too will only use the means? If the muscles which, when fully
developed, enable one to sit or stand erect for hours together are
now weak, is it not wise to at once strengthen them?
But may not this vigorous muscular exercise, which tends to produce hard
and knotted muscles in the man, take away the softer and more graceful
lines, which are essentially feminine? If exercise be kept up for hours
together, as in the case of the blacksmith, undoubtedly it would. But that
is a thing a sensible system of exercise would avoid, as studiously as it
would the weakness and inefficiency which result from no work. A little
trial soon tells what amount of work, and how much of it, is best adapted
to each pupil; then the daily maintaining of that proportion or kind of
exercise, and its increase, as the newly-acquired strength justifies and
invites it, is all that is required. Without that hardness and solidity
which are essentially masculine, there still comes a firmness and
plumpness of muscle to which the unused arm or back was a stranger.
Instead of these being incompatible with beauty, they are directly
accessory to it. "Elegance of form in the human figure," says Emerson,
"marks some excellence of structure;" and again, "any real increase of
fitness to its end, in any fabric or organism, is an increase of beauty."
Look at the famous beauties of any age, and everything in the picture or
statue points to this same firmness and symmetry of make, this freedom
from either leanness or flabbiness. The Venuses and Junos, the Minervas,
Niobes, and Helens of mythology, the Madonnas, the mediaeval beauties,
all alike have the well-developed and shapely arm and shoulder, the high
chest, the vigorous body, and the firm and erect carriage. Were there a
thin chest or a flat shoulder, a poor and feeble arm or a contracted
waist, it would at once mar the picture, and bring down on it judgment
anything but favorable. Put now on the canvas or in marble, not the
strongest and most comely, neither the weakest and least-favored, of our
American girls or women, but simply her who fairly represents the
average, and, however well the face and expression might suffice,
the imperfect physical development, and indifferent figure and
carriage, would at once justly provoke unfavorable comment.
That the same vigorous exercise and training which brought forth womanly
physical beauty in ancient days will bring it out now, there need be no
manner of doubt. A most apt and excellent case in point was mentioned
in the _New York Tribune_ of June 19th, 1878. It said:
"The study and practice of gymnastics are to be made compulsory in all the
State schools in Italy. The apostle of physical culture in that enervating
climate is Sebastian Fenzi, the son of a Florence banker. He built a
gymnasium at his own expense in that city, and from that beginning the
movement has extended from city to city. He has preached gymnastics to
senators and deputies, to the syndic and municipal councillors, and even
to the crown princess, now queen. _He especially inculcates its advantages
on all mothers of families, as likely to increase to a remarkable extent
the personal charms of their daughters._ And so far as his own domestic
experience goes, his theories have not been contradicted by practice, for
_he is the father of the most beautiful women in Italy_."
Suppose Mr. Durant at Wellesley, or Mr. Caldwell at Vassar, should at
once introduce in their deservedly famous schools a system of physical
education which should proceed on the simple but intelligent plan, first
of training the weaker muscles of each pupil until they are as strong as
the rest, and then of transferring the young woman thus physically
improved from the class of this or that special work, to that which
insures to all muscles alike ample, daily vigorous exercise. Suppose
that all the girls could be made to consider this daily lesson as much a
matter of course in their studies as anything else. Suppose, again, that
there is a teacher familiar with the work and all its requirements, one
who is capable of interesting others, one who fully enters into the
spirit of it. If such a master or mistress can be found, if the pupils
are instructed--whether they be sitting, standing, or walking--to always
remain erect, is there any reason why the Vassar girls should not soon
have as fine and impressive a carriage as the manly young fellows at the
academy across the river, but a few miles distant?
Looking again at the effect on the mental work, would the daily
half-hour of exercise in-doors, and the hour's constitutional out-doors,
in all weathers, if sensibly arranged, interfere one whit with all the
intellectual progress the girls could or should make? For, is that a
rational system of intellectual progress which brings out a bright
intellect on a half-developed body, and promises fine things in the
future, when the body has had no training adequate to justify the belief
that there will be much of any future? Is not that rather a dear price
to pay for such intellectuality? Hear Herbert Spencer on this point:
"On women the effects of this forcing system are, if possible, even
more injurious than on men. Being in a great measure debarred from those
vigorous and enjoyable exercises of body by which boys mitigate the
evils of excessive study, girls feel these evils in their full
intensity. Hence the much smaller proportion of them who grow up
well-made and healthy. In the pale, angular, flat-chested young ladies,
so abundant in London drawing-rooms, we see the effect of merciless
application unrelieved by youthful sports; and this physical degeneracy
exhibited by them hinders their welfare far more than their many
accomplishments aid it. Mammas anxious to make their daughters
attractive could scarcely choose a course more fatal than this which
sacrifices the body to the mind. Either they disregard the tastes of the
opposite sex, or else their conception of those tastes is erroneous. Men
care comparatively little for erudition in women, but very much for
physical beauty and good nature and sound sense. How many conquests does
the blue-stocking make through her extensive knowledge of history?"
This is a question quite worthy of the consideration of every teacher
of girls in our land, and a paragraph full of suggestion, not
only to every parent having a child's interests in his or her
keeping, but to every spirited girl herself as well.
Every school-girl in America could be daily practised in a few simple
exercises, calling for no costly, intricate, or dangerous apparatus, taking
a little time, but yet expanding her lungs, invigorating her circulation,
strengthening her digestion, giving every muscle and joint of her body
vigorous play, and so keeping her toned up, and strong enough to be free
from much danger either of incurring serious disease, or any of the lighter
ailments so common among us. As to her usefulness, no matter where her lot
is to be cast, it will be increased, and, it is not too much to add, her
happiness would be greatly enhanced through all her life as well.