Health and Athletics.

Otago Witness, Issue 2993, 26 July 1911, Page 76

Health and Athletics.

, The efibet of physical exercise on mental development is often forgotten or overlooked. Not only is the form of the body made more perfect, not only are the vital functions carried out with greater regularity and vigour, but' the senses are rendered more acute and better able to carry out their important duties. The sense of sight is specially benefited by physical exercises; the muscles which . move the eyeballs are mad© to play with greater precision, so that the sweep of the sight is more rapid and more exact than it would be if good training were omitted; and the power of sight is more steadily maintained. The sense of hearing is in like manner rendered more acute and perfect; sounds high and low are more distinctly appreciated, and the perception of the direction of sound comes an easv practice. Moreover, tlie well-trained man learns in a very short time to make up his mind as to what is best to be dona on emergency. He discovers that to. ,'jccide wrongly is better than not to d©ci£i» at all, so that at last he

becomes competent in an almost automatic manner to know at one© what is the best thing to be done at any given time, and what is tbe_ most graceful and safest way to do that t<£ng Decision demands at all times a wholesome mental training, based on correct foresight and sound principle, and there is not a single contest of physical skill in which decision is not called for at every stage. Another good mental quality brought out by good training is that it leads to mind.