THE WRESTLING SCHOOL.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXXIX, Issue 4, 27 July 1907, Page 25

THE WRESTLING SCHOOL.

Continued from page 12*. was nothing approaching had temper manifested, or in evidence, among the combatants and as each set concluded, the competitors did not forget to bow themselves to the mat in their desire to do the other honour. By 4 o'clock in came numbers of youths and boys front different schools and colleges. Some of these were mere beginners, but others of them had gained considerable proficiency in the art, and gave a capital exhibition of skill. Those who rested sat round and watched che others for points, and the utmost decorum prevailed. THE NATIONAL TOURNAMENT. The events of the year in the wrestling world in Japan are the big matches, which come off between representatives of Tokyo and district, and those of Osaka and district. Over these events excitement runs high: the contests are witnessed by many hundreds of people, and the winners are most popular. Many of these wrestlers are men of enormous weight and girth. The protean mals do not marry while following their art, and usually at 30 years of age ill,-' retire from the arena as professiona>. and take upon themselves the carps of domesticity. Needless to say. in all the colleges and schools the youth of both sexes are taught to make the best use of their limbs for offence and defence. At the Technical School in Osaka the young mon may be seen in armour dealing each other terrific blows with weapons like old-fashioned swords, and the skill with which many of those blows are warded off must give quickness to the eye ami steadiness to the nerve. To the average European the police in Japan appear to be like so many goodnatured boys out on a holiday. Their swords make thorn appear smaller than they are. and their smooth faces appear constantly illumined by a smile, as they instruct some perplexed one, or direct the trafiie where the loads meet. But woe be to the European who would turn one of those unasViming little men info an adversary. With the greatest ease in the worM one of these men will march off to the police station an offender twice his own size. They are most carefully instructed in the arts of the gymnast, wrestler, sword fencer; and the wrongdoer who sets himself in opposition to their will soon finds Io his cost that the police of Japan are very different men to big Policeman Murphy, of the Southern Cross type.

WHERE CIRCUS TROUPES COME hXJM. The wrestling schools are favoured by both sexes. To an extent undreamt of by our girls, do Japanese girls master the science of the gymnasium. Their skill, their powers of endurance, their nerve, are astounding to (nose who have not witnessed their training. I have seen a young Japanese girl catch witli her feet a cask which was thrown to her as she lay upon a table; this cask she spun round in every conceivable fashion with her feet; then she raised the cask up, and put a smaller one under it. This she repeated until she had six small ones and one large cask on the top, all supported in the air with her feet. Then the pyramid was lowered, and a small boy got inside tin* cask, and the whole was built up as before; and when this was done, the boy came out of the cask, climbed up on io it, and stood upright, the whole being suspended and balanced by the girl's feet as she lay on her back. The gymnasium is the explanation. 1 have seen some extraordinary things done on the trapeze in Australia, but 1 had to come to Japan to see this business carried to perfection, and that by people who physically appear inferior to us. [Our contributor is surely not a circus patron; Japanese equilibriests, tub-balancers, tight-rope walkers, and contortionists are known to most Au>.tralasians. —Ed. ] THE POWER FOR WAR.

The practical benefit of all this physical training has already been made apparent to the nations of the world. When the allied forces marched to the relief of Pekin the Japs were first on the march, and the first to enter t'f- s t’ekcn city. At that time both English and German military experts were impressed by the mobility, and sustaining power ot the Japanese troops. But the larger exhibition of these qualities was given in the recent terrific struggle between Russia and Japan. The Japanese were constantly doing something that the Russians did not reckon upon, and they were always appearing where they were not expected. The battle of the Yalu was won because the Japanese (ramped through a shallow part of the sea and gained a position that was not considered in danger. Some parts of Port Arthur'* defences wore regarded as being unscalable, but the Japanese wore fount there at the right moment, and that in spite of shot and mine. It is this very quality that makes the Japanese a power to be reckoned with in the future movements of nations. Il is impossible for any other nation to predict what they can do. or what they will do, for no other nation |>ossesses a corresponding number of men who know Low to get the greatest amount of power out of the human body, backed up with intelligence. A race of clerks and millionaires will in case of conflict go down before the Japanese like a fleet of Sam paua before a typhoon. For throe years every Japanese youth is under compulsory military service, but Indore he goes into the military barracks at all he has largely brought his body into such subjection that he can get out of it the maximum of agility and endurance. So when there is added to this, military training, there is a combiii.ition tiiat naturally produces the finest infantry in the world. THE MORAL OF IT. Both Australia and New Zealand should profit by Japan's example in this respect. We give a great deal too much time to sports that do not make lot physical development and the cultivation of endurance and agility, notably horseracing. Many of our other sports only tend to lopsided development, as cycling ami even football. A man who ren ders the best service needs a straight back as well as big calves, and a good eye. with steady nerve, as well as sound lungs. We seem to be immersed in business ami money-making, as if these were our surest preventives from all future ills. 1 am satisfied that could some of our youth see what it is possible for Japanese youth to accomplish through the gymnasium they would !»• fired with a determination to emulate their example. Public encouragement would do a good deal to foster this spirit. and to make such an object a laudable one. Such encouragement would not provoke the quarrelsome element, for a more peaceable, affectionate lot n! people amongst themselves it would tie difficult to find than the Japanese. Back to the gymnasium?