RECREATION.

Bruce Herald, Volume XXI, Issue 2178, 27 June 1890, Page 5

RECREATION.

The father or the mother of a family may easily feel a little puzzled as to what special form of recreation the members thereof should choose, and they (the parents) should encourage. For although pleasurable exercise and amusement are wonderfully succeessful in keeping the doctor's chariot away from the door, they must be well timed and judiciously carried out. The old saying, " All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy," is exceedingly true. But, on the other hand, recreation must not be carried to excess either physically or morally. Physically, recreation can be overdone. It matters nothing what outdoor game be chosen or commends itself to one — whether cricket;, tennis, football, bowls, or golf; or what kind of pleasurable exercise— whether boating, riding, walking, or cycling, but, w'lile enjoying it, we must never approach too closely to the boundary-line of exhausting fatigue. The same may be said for indoor games and exercises ; bub even those that do not entail muscular exertion, but are better described as pastimes, should never be continuad until fchey have become a weariness. It may not be generally known that so apparently trivial au act as that of

YAWNING BETJRATS A TIRED HEAET, and is an effort of Nature to stimulate that organ to the getting rid of venous blood by pumping it into the lungs. What is commonly knowu by the term

stretch' ng one's self " (and thia, by the ! B way, is us ially accompanied by yawniu x) P lis an ither sign of fatigue, and has for Its tl obj-iC L , like the yawn, the simulating of itl a tired heart. Tiose who lead sedentary a lives, sitting lou» with Inad and back bent over the desk, and probably thinking hard all the while, are subject to fits of stretching and yawning. Out they 1 ought to go, into the fresh air, a? soon i as nature vouchsafes these wirnings. . i . . These are really not trivial 1 matters, for, whatever wa do, we should ' , not age the heart. Ifc is not that heartdisease in a valvular or organic shape is ' • to be greatly feared, but something as i bad in the long run, though the sympt toms may never at any time be very } urgent. What we mean is this: if we r neglect reception, if we work too hard s and sit too long afc desk work, THE HEA.RT BECOMES FEEBLE, and virtually old. If, on the other 6 hand, we carry exercise to excess ; if we r row too hard, if we constantly " spurt " c when cycling, if we are in the habit of r lifting weights unsuited to our strength, A then we are apt to stretch the right side » of the heart. And the life of one who ">• has either a feeble heart or an enlarged g righl-heart is not to be envied. It is 8 mostly a weariness, and one afflicted -- thus is generally nervous, and hardly c ever knows what it is to be otherwise ■-s than tired. . . . But one may be

guilty of excess in recreative exercises or amusements from even a moral point of view. The converse of the old saying about Jack and play is equally true ; all play and little work entirely unfits Jack for the battle of life, ani he soon falls to the rear, and is heard of nevermore. — From Cassell's Book of the Household.