eal, against the Aladdin's palaces of Chicago.
"I observe," admits the Englishman, "that an American can accomplish
more, at a single effort, than any other man on earth; but I also
observe that he exhausts himself in the achievement. Kane, a delicate
invalid, astounds the world by his two Arctic winters,--and then dies in
tropical Cuba." The solution is simple; nervous energy is grand, and so
is muscular power; combine the two, and you move the world.

We shall assume, as admitted, therefore, the deficiency of physical
health in America, and the need of a great amendment. But into the
general question of cause and cure we do not propose to enter. In view
of the vast variety of special theories, and the inadequacy of any one,
(or any dozen,) we shall forbear. To our thinking, the best diagnosis
of the universal American disease is to be found in Andral's
famous description of the cholera: "Anatomical characteristics,
insufficient;--cause, mysterious;--nature, hypothetical;--symptoms,
characteristic;--diagnosis, easy;--_treatment, very doubtful_."

Every man must have his hobby, however, and it is a great deal to ride
only one hobby at a time. For the present we disavow all minor ones.
We forbear giving our pet arguments in defence of animal food, and in
opposition to tobacco, coffee, and india-rubbers. We will not criticize
the old-school physician whom we once knew, who boasted of not having
performed a thorough ablution for twenty-five years; nor will we
question the physiological orthodoxy of Miss Sedgwick's New England
artist, who represented the Goddess of Health with a pair of flannel
drawers on. Still less should we think of debating (or of tasting)
Kennedy's Medical Discovery, or R.R.R., or the Cow Pepsin. We know our
aim, and will pursue it with a single eye.

"The wise for cure on _exercise_ depend,"

saith Dryden,--and that is our hobby.

A great physician has said, "I know not which is most indispensable
for the support of the frame,--food or exercise." But who, in this
community, really takes exercise? Even the mechanic commonly confines
himself to one set of muscles; the blacksmith acquires strength in his
right arm, and the dancing-master in his left leg. But the professional
or business man, what muscles has he at all? The tradition, that
Phidippides ran from Athens to Sparta, one hundred and twenty miles, in
two days, seems to us Americans as mythical as the Golden Fleece. Even
to ride sixty mile