Favorable To Health

Many of the athletic sports, if purued for sport or as a recreation, are valuable remedial helps and aid toward physical improvement, says the North American Review. Unf ortunately, the spirit of emulation in athletics, which in some communities has grown into intense rivalry, is likely to lead to excesses in and practice for contests, which unless checked and brought down to a rational basis may; do more harm than g-ood. Many young uien seem to think that because the practice of athletics is favorable to health the more they can g-et of this practice the better. This is an erroneous impression, for it is as possible to overwork in athletica as it is in business and a great many young people do themselves injury by their excessive zeal in the practice of competitive exercise. In this line of physical activity, as in any other, there is a limit to human capability and it is possible to develop the muscular and nervous systems to the detriment of the heart and lung-s or of the dig-estive system. But the conditions under which athletics are usually practiced are so favorable to the maintenance of health and vigor that few persons who were sound at the time of commencing their athletic efforts have injured themselves by the practice of these vigorous exercises. It is true that a certain mimber of young men who were distinguished for their supremacy in certain athletic events have died young. But the number of men who are now practicing athletic exereises in this country and appearing in public contests is very large, as many as 600 or 700 entries being recorded in some of the great city meetings.