IS IT TOO LATE FOR WOMEN TO BEGIN?
speed. The measured precision of that lady's stroke; the stately poise of the body and head; and the clean, neat, and effective feathering, would have done credit to an old Oxford oar.
What woman has done, woman may do. Bind one arm in a sling, and keep it utterly idle for a month; meanwhile ply the other busily with heavy work, such as swinging a hammer, axe, or dumb-bell; and is it hard to say which will be the healthier, the plumper, the stronger, the handsomer—the live arm, at the end of the month? And will this only apply to men's arms, and not to women's? Who has usually the stronger, and almost generally the shapelier arm—the woman who, surrounded with servants, takes her royal ease; and has American notions and ways of exercise; or the busy maid in her kitchen? If the latter's arm is large, yet not well proportioned; it simply means that some of its muscles have been used far more than the others.
Now, to her who knows what exercise will develop each of the muscles of that arm; and who can tell at sight which are fully developed or developed at all, and which are not; it is easy to bring up the backward ones; and so secure the symmetry and the consequent general strength. The same rule holds good of all the other muscles, as well as those of the arm.
Plenty of active out-door work will go far towards securing health. But it will only develop the parts brought into play; and there ought to be exercise for all.
Now what daily work, and how much of it, will secure this symmetry, erectness, and strength; supposing that, at the outset, there is no organic defect; but that the woman is simply weak, both in her muscular and in her vital systems? In the first place, let it be understood that the connection between these systems is intimate;
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