BRIEF SYSTEMATIC EXERCISE
"The muscular additions to the arms and shoulders, and the expansion of the chest, were so great as to have absolutely a ludicrous and embarrassing result; for, before the fourth month, several of the men could not get into their uniforms, jackets, and tunics, without assistance; and when they had got them on, they could not get them to meet down the middle by a hand's-breadth. In a month more they could not get into them at all; and new clothing had to be procured; pending the arrival of which, the men had to go to and from the gymnasium in their great-coats. One of these men gained five inches in actual girth of chest."
And Dr. Sargent had one pupil who gained in chest girth four inches in six weeks.
And Maclaren well adds:
"Now who shall tell the value of these five inches of chest, five inches of additional space for the heart and lungs to work in?"
Hardly five inches more of heart and lung room, though; for part of the gain must have been of course from the enlargement of the muscles on the outside of the chest.
He also hit upon another plan of showing the change; for he says he had them photographed, stripped to the waist, both at first and when the four months were over, and the change even in these portraits was very distinct; and most notably in the youngest, who was nineteen; for, besides the acquisition of muscle, there was in his case "a readjustment and expansion of the osseous frame-work upon which the muscles are distributed." Now let us look a little at the measurements and the actual changes wrought.
In the first place, this last instance settles conclusively one matter most important to flat-chested youth, namely, whether the shape of the chest itself can be changed; for here it was done, and in a very short time at that.
And in his Types and Methods of Respiration, Dr. J.
137
