Useless Endurance
On Thursday afternoon, Parker, the mustang-rider, gave up for the second, and, it is to be hoped, the last time, his attempt to ride 300 miles in fifteen hours. As on the first occasion, he became blind from the rapid exhaustion of vital forcé, the loss of which no stimulants could replace. But, suppose a little additional power of endurnnce and of will had carried him through ? Itwould simply prove that a man of Anglo-Saxon blood may accomplish as much as a South American Gaucho, or a Tartar of Mongolia. As a merely mechanica! feat, it would by no means flx the limit of human endurance when upheld by some powerful purpose. When Charles XII. of Sweden, rode from Adrianople to Stralsund, in the early winter- a distance of not less than 1,200 miles - he performed a greater exploit, andit]meant sometning. When Fremont rede from Los Angelos to Monterey and back - 800 miles in six days of travel - he had an important object to accomplish. Undoubtedly many men could be found capable of riding 300 miles in fifteen hours, under the spnr of some overwhelniing necessity. Similar or equal feats hsve been performed, over and over aicain, in all ages of the world. Capt. Boyton, last summer, floated across the channel in his buoyant Indiarubber costume, and had much to say of his physical exhaustion, so long as he had no rival ; but the Englishman, Webb, swam the same distance with no other float than the national pride. The strength which is developed by systematie training, and exercised under the most favorable cixcumstances, may excite curiosity ; but it is a very imperfect test of human endurance. So far from establishing a standard of physical development, it rather teaches us what to avoid. Dr. Winship may develop a pair of Herculean shoulders upon a small body, but he simply shows us the use.lessness of his special lifting capacity. Weston may walk his 120 miles in twenty-four hours, by the aid of scientific feeding and grooming, but no sensible man would desire to do the same thiug. One variety of force is always cultivated at the expense of other equally necessary forces, and is more or less a nionstrosity. ïhere is little in it to admire, and nothing to imítate. Such a performance as that at Fleetwood park lacks every picturesque and heroic element. One gallop around the hot and dusty ring is the picture of the whole 300 miles to the spectators, and their chief interest must be in waiting for the moment when the man, instead of the mustang, shall be attacked with the blind staggers. There is no law, we suppose, to prevent Parker from riding himself dead as well as blind ; but tho uselessness of the show has now reached that point where it becomes cruelty, and it should not be repeated. Cannot Mr. Borgh, for once, consider a man as good as an animal, and hold his protecting shield over the mustang-rider? - New York Tribune.
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Old News
Michigan Argus