INJURIOUS INFLUENCES OF CITY LIFE.

Waikato Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 2572, 5 January 1889, Page 2 (Supplement)

INJURIOUS INFLUENCES OF CITY LIFE.

Ik thorn is one general physical difference between the country-bred and the eitybred man, it lies in the size and the strength of the muscles of the shoulder and the arm. It is almost impossible for a man to live in the country without using the arms far more than the average city man. This use of the arms has, in both men and women, an important bearing on the general health, since it increases the capacity of the chest, and thereby the surface of the lung-tissue where the blood is spread out in thin-walled, vessels through which the oxygen and carbonic acid easily pass in opposite directions, serving thus the double purpose of feeding the body more abundantly and of removing a constantly accumulating waste product. This richer blood is again driven with greater, force by increased heart and arterial action through its circuit. The vital organs are better nourished, aud the power to produce work is increased. Few will deny that a well nourished body can be trained to do more and better mental work than the same organism in a feebler state. Walking on an even surface, the only variety of physical exercise which most business and professional men get in town is well known to be a poor substitute for arw-e.vortion. The reason is partially plain, since walking is almost automatic and involuntary. The walking mechanism is sot in motion as we would turn an hour-glass, and requires little attention, much volition, and separate discharges of force from the brain-surface with each muscular contraction, as in thy cist: with the great majority ot arm-movements. The armuser is a higher animal than the leg-user. Arm-motions are more nearly associated with mental action than leg-movements. A man's lower limbs merely carry his higher centres to his food or work. The latter must be executed with his arms and hands. A third way in which ai'in-cxcreise benelit.s the organism is through the nervous system. Whether this is due to an increased supply of richer, purer blood, or whether the continual discharge ot motor impulses in some way stores up another vatiuiy of of force, wo do not Umow. Uue tiling is certain, the victim A ueurastiiania ia

very seldom an individual who daily uses hi;; arms for imiociilar work ; with thi-< limit of hurtful motitiil work is seldom reached. It seems evident that arm rather than leg-movements are essential for increased productive power. If tiles' are neglected, the ni in, as a social factor, degenerates and falls a [vey to his stronger fellow-men in the race for supremacy and productiveness. It may be remarked that American gout, tli.it condition of the blood which causes our English cousins pain in tlidr feet, and American univer.-.al pains and increased irritability, has one sovereign remedy *o simple that few will take it, and this is daily systematic arm-exercise. It is nature's sedative for which she charges nothing the next day, but gives us sleep instead of insomnia, and cheerfulness in place of discontent. A man may walk in an hour four miles, on a city sidewalk, and reaoh his desk tired, exhausted of force, and better only for the open air and a slight increase of the circulation. Had he spent half that time in a wellordered gyinnasiu'vi, using chest and rowing-weights, and, after a sponge-bath, if he had gone by rapid transit to his office, he would have found his work <>f a very different colour, easier to do, and taking less time to perform. The view for some time held by Hartwell, of the Johns Hopkins University ; Sargent, of Harvard, and others, that arm-exercise prevents, or does away with, nervous irritability, and at the same time increases the absolute capacity for mental work, has not been sufficiently nreed or accepted. The remedy for this state of tilings is to cause every man and woman to realise the importance of arm exorcise. Make it compulsory in schools, and popular after leaving school. If one's occupation does not require in itself, muscular exertion of some kind ought to be taken daily, with the same regularity as food and sleep, and all three are necessary to the fullest development of our powers.—Popular Science Monthly (U.S.)