only with an idea of stirring girls up to
their best possibilities, for there is not a woman born with a sound
mind who is not capable of reacting mentally, in a greater or less
degree, to all that she hears, provided she uses her will consciously
to form the new habit.

Now this need of intelligent reaction is just the trouble with girls
and physical culture. Physical culture should be a means to an end--and
that is all, absolutely all. It is delightful and strengthening when it
is taught thoughtfully as a means to an end, and I might almost say it
is only weakening when it is made an end in itself.

Girls need to react intelligently to what is given them in physical
training as much as to what is given them in a lecture on literature or
philosophy or botany. How many girls do we know who take physical
culture in a class, often simply because it is popular at the time, and
never think of taking a long walk in the country--never think of going
in for a vigorous outdoor game? How many girls do we know who take
physical culture and never think of making life easy for their
stomachs, or seeing that they get a normal amount of sleep? Exercise in
the fresh air, with a hearty objective interest in all that is going on
about us, is the very best sort of exercise that we can take, and
physical culture is worse than nothing if it is not taken only as a
means to enable us to do more in the open air, and do it better, and
gain from it more life.

There is one girl who comes to my mind of whom I should like to tell
because she illustrates truly a point that we cannot consider too
carefully. She went to a nerve specialist very much broken in health,
and when asked if she took plenty of exercise in the open air she
replied "Yes, indeed." And it was proved to be the very best exercise.
She had a good horse, and she rode well; she rode a great deal, and not
too much. She had interesting dogs and she took them with her. She
walked, too, in beautiful country. But she was carrying in her mind all
the time extreme resistance to other circumstances of her life. She did
not know how to drop the resistance or face the circumstances, and the
mental strain in which she held herself day and night, waking or
sleeping, prevented the outdoor exercise from really refreshing her.
When she learned to face the circumstances then the exercise could do
its good work.

On the other hand, there are many forms of nervous resistance and many
disagreeab