The Pedestrian's Record

46 the pedestrian's record. choose to call it, must be studiously avoided by the athlete. Even drinking before a race or after it pro­ duces no good effect; it neither banishes nervousness, supposing it exists, neither does it re-invigorate an exhausted system. The common questions " What will you take ? Let's have a drink," are sentences of such everyday occurrence, even to the good and wise, who sometimes accept these favours, that we cannot shut our eyes to the fact that "nipping" has become a national calamity. The human body requires very little liquid to keep it in health, and this is proved by the fact that men often do not drink because they are thirsty, but for the lack of something better to do, or from the love of alcoholic imbibition, or as a pastime, somewhat in the same manner as Charles Dickens said : he liked a glass of wine because it was some­ thing to play with. An athlete, and people generally, should never drink between meals, and it is always wiser to empty the pewter after than during the feast, when it will form an after-dinner cup in association with a post-prandial weed. Sir Walter Raleigh first introduced the noxious weed into Great Britain, and found solace from its aroma, and since his time to the present its consumption has increased, and its de­ votees therefore have become more numerous; but this does not prove that it possesses any virtues, or that smoking is productive of any good effect on the human system. It seems to us that it does no harm ; it may, if indulged to excess, undermine the nervous centres, but when taken in moderation seems rather