In prize-fights, the fight is stopped every two or three minutes, and two minutes' rest is taken. This interruption of the fight at short intervals would seem at first to lessen its brutality; but it is really a way of rendering its results more murderous. Formerly, when the rounds were longer, lasting ten minutes, the boxers quickly became fatigued. Their blows became less certain, and produced less serious injuries. Weariness, quite as much as wounds, made it impossible to continue the fight. Now-a-days, with short rounds and frequent rests, the adversaries husband their strength, and their blows are as hard at the end as they were at first. The beaten man has to yield, not because he is wearied, but because he is seriously injured. In spite of their strength and their wonderful staying powers, the combatants could not, without these periods of rest, endure the prolonged fatigues of these fights, which often last several hours.

CHAPTER I.

POWER OF RESISTING FATIGUE.

Variability in the Power of Resisting Fatigue-Effects of Inaction-Effects of Habitual Activity-Different Mode of Life causes Different Conformation; Frugivorous Animals and Hunting Animals; the Flesh of the Hale and the Flesh of the Wolf-The Labourer and the Scholar-How we must explain "Habituation to Work.

MEN who have for a long time abstained from bodily exercise, and whose system most keenly suffers from the want of it, are those by whom fatigue is most to be dreaded, and those who have most risk of suffering from overwork. Those who, on the contrary, daily perform muscular work acquire the power of braving fatigue and successfully striving against its most serious manifestations.

But this immunity which is gained by work is very quickly lost by inaction; it can only be preserved by the habitual practice of muscular exercise.

We may say that too prolonged repose is the condition which most effectively predisposes the organism to fatigue. Stiffness is unknown to men who lead a life of continual muscular activity, and the consequences of overwork affect them with difficulty. Fatigue in all its forms and all its degrees especially makes its effects felt on those who take too much rest. We see women who never walk a step in the street; their carriage renders it unnecessary; they do not even make any movements in dressing themselves; they have a maid to save them the trouble. These persons suffer from stiffness if they walk the length of the street. If one day by chance, on the advice of their medical man,