THE ATHLETIC QUESTION.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2192, 5 March 1881, Page 2

THE ATHLETIC QUESTION.

A good doal of discussion has been going on in the proas of lato with regard to the general question of athletics. In Australia and Now Zealand, articles and letters without number have appeared rather deprecating the length to which the training of the young and muscular colonial has been carried. It is insinuated that the brain suffers by the excessive culture of the vile corpus, and harrowing pictures have been drawn of the Australian of the future, in which he resembles a powerful monkey mor o than a man. This is no doubt a reaction from the feeling of pride which we have all felt in the doings of Australian cricketers and oarsmen in the Old Country. Our athletes have proved beyond a doubt that the prowess of the race has not degenerated by transplantation to the antipodes. At the same time the growth of larrikinism has called for general comment, and the aping by that class of field sports has had the effect of saddling athletics generally with the shortcomings of these youthful rowdies.

Tina is manifestly unfair, because it has not been in any way proved either that the bulk of larrikins are really athletes or that athletes are at all universally larrikins. Moreover, the holders of this new doctrine mix it up curiously with the education question. The secular system of education is freely coupled with athletics as the source of the evil complained of. By implication the denominational system and godliness are coupled with a quiescent habit of body, a creed curiously similar to that which obtained in the early Middle Ages, when absence of exertion was held by the hermits to constitute the highest claim to heaven. The reaction we have alluded to has, like most reactions, gone to extreme lengths. Athletics healthily carried on cannot do much harm, and it is utterly unjust to saddle them with the faults of the larrikins. Looking at what obtains in our own community it may fairly be said that the cricketing and boating section of it have never been considered in any way to be misconducted. Indeed very much the contrary, and, as a proof of this, it may bo pointed out that managers of Banks and business managers generally are always anxious to encourage their employes in this direction, being well aware of the fact that persons who actively employ their bodies in this way are loss likely to fall into other mischief. With statements such as those made by Mr. J. P. Hogan—mentioned in a paragraph in another column—that the love of field sports is deteriorating the Australian race, wo entirely differ. If they are deteriorating it is not the fault that they are too much given to cricket and football. Climatic influences should have a thousand times greater influence, and there are other causes peculiar to a new country, where wealth has suddenly accumulated under abnormal circumstances, which cannot but have a direct tendency towards the plague of an unsettled youth. It must not be thought that we have been touching in any way on that bastard offshoot of athletics illustrated by walking matches against time and other such abominations. These exhibitions have no connection with the true stem. They can do no possible good, and no true athlete would think of countenancing them. The Greeks understood these matters far better than many newspaper writers and correspondents of the present day. They saw that the spiritual essence of a man was not the whole man : that for a certain period that essence was confined in, and partially influenced by, a corporeal body, and that the former had not a fair field before it, if, what has been termed its prison house, was not strengthened and fortified in every possible direction. Hence the training of their young men contained a complete system for the bringing of their bodies to the greatest perfection. And in connection with this subject we may welcome the formation of the Athletic Association, whose first meeting is being held this afternoon. It should have a direct tendency towards encouraging true athletics, and keeping down the spurious forms of it. The rules of the Association are specially framed to exclude from its meetings all those who in any way are mixed up with the professional exhibitions which are so objectionable. It is a society constructed for the direct purpose of encouraging athletics in their best form, and should, if properly managed, have a powerful influence in the way of purifying the sporting atmosphere. We understand that the number of its members is veryconsiderable, and that it has already gained an all - round support. It supplies a want felt for some considerable time, and wo wish it long life and prosperity.